Testing the Limit
by Nessa Star
Summary: Pushed to the edge of sanity in his second year, Harry delves into something that may have been better off left alone... Parseltongue. But what toll does magic take on a person? And what must one give up in order to perform it correctly...?
1. Chapter 1

Yeah, yeah- I KNOW we writers aren't supposed to work on more than one thing at once, but seriously- come ON. I'm not afraid to admit I'm a bit whimsical. I write what calls to me- and this story was calling.

I don't know. Whatever.

I don't own Harry Potter.

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He was in the library.

It was a very different sort of concept for him, finding sanctuary in the library. That was more of a Hermione thing.

But he needed answers. And while he was at it, he might be able to find a little of that peace of mind that she always told him about, too.

_Hermione_...

But no, he couldn't let himself get caught up in that. He had to keep his mind on his work. Maybe... maybe then he could find a way to save her...  
He turned the page in his book, shaking his head to clear it. This was heavy stuff, but it wasn't like it wasn't interesting... or pertinent...

_The gift of Parseltongue is passed on not through bloodlines, but through the choosing of an heir- whether by personal choice or by force- by the transfer of magic from one individual to another (see "Magical Resonance" pages 341-370). The most common of aspects of this dark gift is the ability to speak to snakes, closely tied with their innate charisma that draws serpents to a Parselmouth and allows them to bend the creatures to their whim. It has been said that a snake will not willingly betray a Parselmouth, and along the same lines it has been told that venom and other effects that a magical snake may have will not affect one of serpent-kin, but there have been several cases of a more powerful Parselmouth being able to command one of their pets to attack another with the dark gift successfully. It has been so called the "dark gift" because of the secondary abilities that can be accessed through it- every recorded Parselmouth in history has been a prodigy in every sense of the word, but most if not all of them have been shunned for their exceeding talent in Dark Magic and abnormal control and connection to dark creatures. Most of them show signs of exceedingly superior magical abilities very early on in life, but as they grow up and are introduced more and more into normal society, their gifts seem to fade away. Salazar Slytherin himself has been quoted as stating that a Parselmouth can only break the restraint that they impose on themselves through practice of the art of Parseltongue, a double edged blade that not only unlocks their true potential but also opens their soul to the dark corruption that they are known for. Under no circumstances is a Parselmouth to be attacked unless by highly trained individuals. If encountered back off and inform the proper authorities... _

Harry almost felt like being sick, but he held back his emotions until he closed the book, tucked it under his arm, and checked it out of the library. Madame Pince shot him a wary look as he left, but he ignored it.

Only once he was in a relatively deserted hallway on the fourth floor did he break down and fall to his knees, holding an arm over his eyes.

_It was a Defense Against the Dark Arts guide..._

They wrote about it like he was just another dark monster to be defeated. Like he wasn't just another wizard like them. But that wasn't the thing that _truly_ disturbed him...  
It was that it made_ sense_.

The exceedingly powerful magic in his early childhood. The way that everyone expected him to be a genius, but he was just another kid. Why everyone was walking on eggshells around him...

_No. He wasn't like that._

He wasn't some murderer. Not for the first time, he desperately wished Hermione was there to help- to think for him so that he didn't have to figure all this out.

_It wasn't him. He knew that._

That was the one thing he was sure of. He was _not_ doing these atrocities. He_ couldn't _be- after all, how would that work? He didn't remember anything about that, and if he was doing it in his sleep, then why did the attacks come about when he was awake...?

Shaking his head, he turned away from the way to the great hall and headed towards the hospital wing. Hermione had always been there for him before- always been able to solve everything.

He supposed it was only now that she couldn't help him that he realized just how much he relied on her...

Damn it. _Damn it._ This was like the ultimate ironic quandary... he was trying to prove that he wasn't evil, but in order to do so he had to be smarter in order to figure out the whole damn mess. If he wanted to be smarter, he would have to practice Parseltongue, which would just make him evil. Damn it... Hermione, Ron... he needed them both, but...

Slipping through the door to the infirmary, he walked over to the curtains around Hermione's bed, unable to force himself to go inside and sit by her. Seeing her would just be too much for him, like that...

His hand went out to the cloth, but it only stayed there, grasping the folds. He could see her well enough without using his eyes... her frozen body, cold as ice... the look of partial shock on her face...

"...don't... don't hurt her!"

He whirled around startled, having not realized that he had company. It was a little boy in a bed in the corner, covers pulled up to his waist, but he seemed to be sitting up with a great deal of effort, wand grasped in one hand. From what he could see of the boy's face, it was half covered in a thick, leathery black skin. House colors... black and yellow...

Harry turned away again, unwilling to do what he had come here to do with someone else in the room. He had wanted to read to her- to come and tell her what had been going on. To let her know how classes were going, on the off chance that she could hear him... And now, this boy thought he had come to finish Hermione off. _The Hufflepuff thought Harry was here to kill his best friend._

He turned away, trying to hide his face from his unwanted company, wiping his cheeks of tear trails quickly. Apparently not quickly enough, as the boy's expression turned from one of seriousness to one of slight shock.

"...I'm sorry for disturbing you..." Harry whispered, trying to slip back out the door again. The fates truly weren't on his side, however, as the Nurse seemed to choose that exact moment to re-enter the room, noticing him immediately.

"...Potter?" she called out. He froze in place, the Defense book almost slipping from his weak hands, but he managed to hold on to it. Madame Pomfrey hurried over to him, frowning slightly. "...what is it, Mr. Potter? Did you need something?"

"...n... no, ma'am." he shook his head quickly. At her incredulous look, he couldn't help but allow his eyes to roam over to the curtains hiding the bed that Hermione had been given, and all at once, the woman seemed to understand.

"...ah. I see." she nodded. She appeared to hesitate for a moment, but finally she got out what she was trying to say. "...perhaps... perhaps if you were to return later, with Mr. Weasley?"

It took him a moment to work out what she meant. Did she know he couldn't handle seeing Hermione by himself? Or did she mean to get across the point that the Hufflepuff boy in the other bed would be gone, later?

When she refused to meet his eyes, another... much more _disturbing_ idea crossed his mind.

Did she think that Harry would hurt Hermione if he was left alone with her without Ron there?

That realization dawning on him, he shied back from her, his bangs falling over his eyes as he stared at the ground._ It had to be the last one._ Why else would she be looking at him like that?

"...I..." he almost started to protest, but conceded to the two of them at last. He had to get used to this, he realized. Even if everyone found out that he hadn't petrified anyone, he would still be a Parselmouth- always and forever. He would always be looked at like this... maybe even by his own friends. "...I'll just... you know, go fetch Ron then, shall I?" he moved for the door, fully intending to do no such thing. He just wanted to go up to Gryffindor tower and bury his head in the pillows, shut out the whole world and pray to whatever cosmic force would listen to him to make everything go back to normal.

Two steps away from the door, the nurse caught his sleeve.

"...Mr. Potter..." she trailed off, and by the look on her face, she had noticed that he realized why she had been so anxious about allowing him near Hermione alone. He forced a weak smile, feeling absolutely miserable inside.

"No, you're right." he murmured, a spiteful farce of the weak happiness he had long since forgotten boiling within him. "Wouldn't want 'Parseltongue Potter' anywhere near his own best friend alone, would we now?" he shook off her hand, bolting for the door.

Halfway up to his common room, he collapsed, unable to hold it in any longer. He managed to drag himself behind a suit of armor before he broke down crying, book laying forgotten at his side.

Just another monster, to them. Just another thing out of the Defense Against the Dark Arts books to be learned about and dealt with accordingly...

It took him a good long time to pull himself back together, but when he did, he managed to wipe his eyes on his sleeve, book clutched to his chest. That book was all the information he had been able to find on Parselmouthes in the whole library- all the information he knew about himself. He couldn't dare loose it, or even that little scrap would be lost to him.

How stupid. He was so useless, in the end...

"...Harry?"

His head snapped up, not wanting any more company, but...

"...Neville?" he muttered, quickly wiping the tears from his eyes. Damn it- even Neville was stronger than he was. At least _he_ wouldn't be off crying in the back corridors like this... didn't he have _any_ self control, today...?

To his great shock, Neville came up to him and put a hand on his shoulder, looking at him in concern. Harry could see from the look on the other boy's face that his tears had not gone unnoticed.

"...You're..." he trailed off, trying to figure out something to say that wouldn't be inappropriate. "...come on." he finally got out, his voice quiet. "Let's get you up to the tower. Okay, Harry?"

Harry hid his eyes behind his hand, shaking his head. He wanted to go back to the common room, sure- but that just meant everyone staring at him as he passed by, and in his current state, it wouldn't be prudent to let them see him crying. He just wanted to go bury himself and never come back...

"Are you sure?" Neville asked, and at the insistent nod that Harry gave him, he put a hand on the Parselmouth's shoulder, steering him away from his dreary alcove behind the statue. "Do you want to go outside? Will that help?" Harry shook his head again, still not dropping his hand from his eyes. He wasn't ready to let Neville see the look on his face- not yet.

His final suggestion made Harry pause, however- it was the first thing he had actually considered instead of simply dismissing it instantly.

"That's fine, Harry. What about one of the empty classrooms? Do you want to go inside and talk for a while?"

He slowly looked up, meeting the other boy's eyes at long last. He didn't know it, but his own eyes were shining a killing-curse green with tears from behind his glasses. After a few moments... he finally nodded, looking down at the floor.

Neville was the first one besides Ron and Hermione to just... come up to him and give him unwavering trust without a second thought. And even they had seemed to wonder there, for a while...

Allowing the botanically-inclined boy to gently shepard him into one of the many empty rooms of the castle, he only held the book tightly to his chest like a lifeline. This was all he could do. Neville had been raised by wizards, right? He knew about stuff like this, right?

...right?

As soon as the door was closed and the lights were lit, Harry turned on his heel to look straight at Neville, searching his face for any small hint of a lie in response to what he asked him.

"What do you think of... of people who can..." he bit it back, not really realizing how adverse he had grown to be to saying the words out loud. "...you know... people like me?"

"What do I think of Parselmouthes, you mean?" Neville asked. When Harry nodded, the boy gave him a weak smile. "...I think... you know, it's just like Werewolves and Vampires and things. People say they're bad, but it's just superstition, right? I mean... I _know_ you'd never hurt Hermione. You'd never hurt anyone, is what I mean... but especially Hermione." he said it clumsily, almost like he didn't know how he was supposed to phrase what he was trying to say, but yet... it made Harry relax.

The green-eyed boy flopped back into a chair, more drained than he had been in a long time, but comfortable. Neville wasn't going to harp on him for it. Maybe one of the only ones in the whole school...

It took him a while to speak up, but when he did, it was the most meaningful thing he could think of. _And_ it was what he had first told Ron and Hermione when they found out...

"...I didn't know what it was." he got out, at last. Neville was looking at him patiently, knowing that Harry needed someone to listen in his current state. "Because I was raised by Muggles. Isn't that stupid? I didn't even know what it was for forever." he trailed off for a moment, immersing himself in a memory from what seemed an eon ago. "...I even... used it before. My cousin's eleventh birthday we went to the zoo. There was this... uh... this python, you know? It just looked so sad and bored, and... well, you know..."

"...you started talking to it, and it talked back?" Neville tried to finish, taking a stab in the dark. Harry snorted.

"...er... I set it loose on my cousin, actually." Neville's eyes bugged out, and Harry raised his hands in his defense. "It's not like that- my cousin is... he deserved it. And it wasn't like it hurt him- just scared him a little..."

Silence. His companion seemed to be processing this.

"...you know what's weird?" he finally asked. "It's stranger to hear you talking about your relatives than it is to learn you set a snake on one of them. You... you don't really talk about them much."

"Oh." Harry looked down, drawing back a little bit. Finally admitting to himself that he couldn't just freeze up at this point and refuse to talk, he formulated the best response he could get out. "...well... it's not like you're missing much or anything. They're..." he trailed off, rubbing his shoulder. He had a scar there from when his uncle had hit him with a vase and it had shattered, driving the shards into his skin. "...they're not exactly... you know... that pleasant."

Neville was silent, staring sideways at Harry's expression. The green-eyed boy scratched the back of his neck, trying to shrug off what he had just said.

"...come on- I don't want to talk about them." he stated at last. Neville interrupted that thought.

"Fine, but just do one thing for me before we move off this topic."

"What is it?" he asked, confused. Neville's response made him freeze in place.

"Tell me three good things about your family without lying."

Silence. Harry was stuck here...

"...well, uh..." he began, determined to think of at least three things. "...they're... uh, clean. And they... they care a lot about Dudley... and, um..."

"But not about you?"

Silence. Harry couldn't bring himself to say anything to that.

"...I'm ...sorry. But Harry, I just..." Neville trailed off, seeming to still be having trouble figuring out how to say what he wanted to say. At last, he got out, "...The only other person I know who talks as little about their family as you do is..." he sighed, biting his lip. "...she was abused by her parents." Harry couldn't hold back a wince, looking away quickly. Apparently, his silence was all that Neville needed to confirm his suspicions.

The Gryffindor sat back in his own seat, letting go of a breath that he didn't seem to remember holding.

"...so it's true, then...?" Neville whispered. "...everyone always sort of knew in the back of their minds, but... no one ever... you know... mentioned it."

"...everyone knew?" Harry looked up, horrified. "What do you mean, everyone knew...?"

"I mean, we all sort of guessed why you didn't talk about them, but no one ever mentioned it. It... wasn't too hard to guess, when you pieced it together. A... lot of people thought you would break down if they said anything about it, so..."

"...they... they _knew_..." he trailed off, closing his eyes. This was outright _hellish_. He had thought that speaking with Neville would at least calm him down, but now the boy had brought up things that Harry didn't even want to_ think_ about.

He shook his head, buried once more under the weight of a decade's pain brought to bear in a single moment of rejection. He didn't need this. Not now. Not while he had so much else on his plate- he didn't need to be reminded of what waited for him back at his farce of a 'home'...

No. That just redoubled his resolve.

Standing up, he stared at Neville for a moment, and the boy looked up at him, innocently concerned for a friend. At long last, he made his decision.

"...yes, Neville." he finally said, calm and cold. "My relatives don't like me. But you know what? That means that if the school gets shut down... or if I get expelled... then that's what I have to go back to. That's what I'll be dealing with until they kill me- lock me in a hole and forget to feed me 'till I starve. So you know what?" he continued, ignoring the look of shock and horror on the boy's face. "I have to stay here- at Hogwarts. I have to be good and stay here, or I get to look forward to going back there and never coming to Hogwarts again. So you know what I need you to do, Neville?" he raised an eyebrow, biting back the lump in his throat. "I need you to tell me everything you know about Parselmouthes. Everything. Every tiny rumor, all of the most inconsequential myths and stories... everything. I need to know what my name really means before I can clear that same name. Can you do that for me?"

Neville nodded quickly, eyes wide.

"...o-of coarse, Harry. If it'll help you, then..."

"Help?" he closed his eyes, reveling in the moment. This was what he needed. This was _exactly_ what he needed... "Neville... this is more than help. I... I don't even know anything about this. I don't know anything about... you know... being a Parselmouth. I don't know..."

"...about you?"

He looked up, eyes wide. That had been exactly what he was about to say...

Neville smiled at him, weakly shrugging.

"...you looked... er, kind of lost. For the last few days, you know? I asked Ron, and he..." Neville glanced down, biting his lip. "...he said you seemed like you... didn't even know yourself anymore. He was... sort of worried, see? So don't get mad at him for it..."

Harry bit his lip for a moment. On the one hand, the fact that Ron was talking about him behind his back made him sort of angry. ...on the other hand, he had been concerned for him. That made things... just about even out, in his opinion.

"...I won't." he agreed. Neville allowed him a small smile, relaxing a little bit in his chosen chair.

"...alright." he closed his eyes, thinking. "...okay, Harry... just- promise me you won't hold it against me? What I'm going to tell you?"

"I wasn't going to." Harry shrugged. "From what I've heard, most of this is... unpleasant." the more shy Gryffindor winced.

"...that's putting it... mildly." The green eyed boy grimaced, staring at the floor.

"Then... just get it over with."

"Parselmouthes aren't supposed to exist." Neville said, out of the blue. Apparently, he took that order seriously. "They're supposed to be myths- you know how rumors escalate so easily. There were all these stories about Parselmouthes, but they're..." he frowned, biting his lip. "...the stories are the sort of fairytale you'd hear at bedtime when you're really little. They're sort of like the... the Muggle... what's the word for it? Bogeyman?" Shuddering, Harry nodded, wanting Neville to say these bad things to get them out of the way. Better to hear them for the first time from the mouth of a friend who meant it as a concerned warning than from the people who actually meant these things...

"...but we do." he murmured. "We do exist. So what does that leave us with?"

"...it leaves us with a whole bunch of mixed up stories about things that Parselmouthes can do. What do you know so far?" Harry thought hard, staring up at Neville for a moment.

"...we speak to snakes, obviously." he murmured. "That makes the connotation to Slytherin, which seems to automatically denote 'dark wizard'. We..." he frowned a moment, remembering some things he had experienced himself. "...can't... actually tell we're speaking it. Did you know that?"

"What do you mean?" Neville blinked. Harry nodded.

"Yeah. I can't tell I'm speaking it, I don't know that the words I'm saying or hearing are in a different language, and above all..." he smiled weakly. "...I have absolutely no bloody clue why the hell people look at me the way they do when they hear it. Does it really sound that weird? It's just hissing, right?"

"...uh..." Neville looked like he was trying to smile, but it looked more like he was sucking on a sour lemon. "...well, sort of... only... you know... creepy? ... almost like Latin mixed in with it..."

"...I'm still lost." Harry sighed. "But it doesn't matter too much. Come on. Isn't there anything else?"

"Lots- but most of it's useless junk. You don't have a split tongue and you don't sleep in a bed of your own shed skin, so that pretty much invalidates more than half the stories..."

"Wait, I don't what-?"

"Don't bother with it." Neville shrugged, looking awkward. "Just stupid rumors. Ah- have you ever been bitten by a snake before?"

Harry just stared at him blankly in reply.

"...ah... that's a no, then?" the boy tried to laugh it off, awkwardly. "See, poison from snakes isn't supposed to affect you. I don't know though- you might not want to test that unless it's really _really_ necessary..."

"Agreed." Harry nodded, staring at the chalkboard. Something else had popped up in his mind, and he realized what might be best. He had a book- harsh words meant to be taken as 'fact'. He also had a friend- a boy steeped in the lore of the wizarding world. Why not compare them with one another?

Silently, he set the book on the table, flipping it open to the well-thumbed page that he had been on countless times before. Neville came over to him, confused, and read over his shoulder for a moment- and as he did so, Harry got to watch the strangely amusing show of how the expressions on the boy's face twisted oddly as he skimmed it. Finally, he closed the book, closing his eyes with a pained wince on his face.

"...most of it's... I'd like to say that most of it's rubbish, but... I mean..."

"You don't know." Harry nodded, realizing what was really wrong here. Neville was no expert on Parselmouthes. There _were_ no experts on such a rare thing.

"I'm sorry Harry, but this isn't-"

"I understand." he reassured the boy, interrupting him. There was a moment of silence... but then, Harry had made up his mind. He turned to Neville, looking serious.

"...I've asked far too much of you." he murmured, very quiet. His timid classmate shook his head vigorously, denying it.

"No, it's no trouble!" he bit his lip shyly. "I'm just sorry I couldn't be of any help..."

"It's alright. Really." Harry smiled at him, realizing the insanity of what he was going to ask. He had no right to ask this of the boy before him. ...and yet, he had to. "...but Neville? I have... just _one_ favor to ask."

"Sure- what is it?" Harry didn't miss the way he perked up at the prospect of being trusted enough to be asked for favors. Harry's expression turned sad, but he still managed to keep the smile on his face, though it looked rather forced.

"...this is going to take a second to explain, so just... hold on a second." he took a deep breath, closing his eyes. "...I need to know this. I really do need to know if it's true. But there's only one way I can do that, isn't there?" at the intake of breath, Harry worked out the fact that Neville had realized what he was aiming at. "Yeah, that's right. I'm going to try some of these things. ...but you read that page. I might go crazy. Go... dark. So I need you to do something for me." He opened his eyes again, staring imploringly up into Neville's shocked face. "I need you to track me down every once in a while and get me to talk to you. I need you to figure out if I'm still alright or not. And if I'm not... well, Dumbledore's easy to find when he wants to be."

Neville was staring at him like he had just professed to being a transfigured gerbil.

"...Harry, you can't be serious...?" he whispered, horrified. The boy who lived shrugged, his mind made up by that point.

"I remember what you did." he pointed out. "Back in first year, when you stood up to Ron and Hermione and I. You're a brave person, Neville. You do the right thing- no matter what else happens. If I asked this of anyone else..." he trailed off, thinking. "...I can't really... ask Hermione to do it, you know? And if I asked Ron..." he shook his head at that idea. "...no, I know that I could fool him into thinking I was still light if I ever went dark. And even then, if he realized... he might not say anything in order to protect me. But not you. I couldn't fool you because you follow your heart, don't you?" he couldn't help but smile at that.

Neville looked torn between being humbled by Harry's assessment of him and being scared of the duty that was being asked of him.

...but in the end he looked up, a light in his eyes that hadn't been there before- and Harry knew what his decision was.

"...you _really_ need to this...?" he whispered, a pained look on his face. At the raven haired boy's nod, Neville sighed, staring at the floor. His feet seemed extraordinarily interesting... "...then... you'll need someone to look after you..."

Harry put a hand on his classmate's shoulder, relieved.

"...you really are much more courageous than people give you credit for." he said, gratefully. Neville shook his head, biting his lip.

"...n-no, I'm not." he denied, voice quivering. "If I was... I'd go report you right now, before you have a chance to do this..."

Harry didn't have a reply to that. He just picked up the book, standing and walking to the door. Then, he paused, glancing back over his shoulder.

"...You coming?" he inquired, after a minute. His friend nodded, stumbling after him, the weight of what Harry had asked him still pushing down on his shoulders.  
When he reached the common room, Harry immediately went up to the dormitories, plopping the book down on his bed and opening it up to the page he practically knew by heart. Neville watched nervously from the doorway, biting his lip- and at last, he asked,

"...what are you doing?"

"Looking for a spell." he murmured, distracted. "Malfoy summoned a snake during our duel. The spell... it was..."

He pulled out his wand, beckoning Neville into the room.

"Close the door. I don't want anyone else to know I'm doing this besides you."

"Not Ron?" He asked, shutting and locking the door quietly. Harry shook his head.

"...no. Not unless I really do go evil and you need help keeping me in check, alright?"

"...okay..."

Harry turned back to his wand, satisfied. He remembered the spell.

"_Serpensorsia!_"

A little flick of the wrist and the spell was complete. Something shot from the end of his wand and impacted onto his bed, tangling itself into the sheets. When it finally managed to lift its head from the sheets, he heard a gasp from his left, but he ignored it, staring straight at the snake.

It was a hooded cobra, mouth opened wide, hissing like it was about to strike.

"_Don't."_

The snake hesitated, closing its mouth immediately. After a moment's confused reluctance, it replied.

"_...you are a speaker._" it hissed back, and Harry nodded.

"_Er... _y_es. That's what I wanted you here for. I need a snake to speak to, if you don't mind._"

The cobra drew back, but this time, it was more in indignation than the need to bite.

"_...I was not... summoned to bite? To kill?_"

Harry shook his head.

"_...you are a strange master._" it hissed back, and as it said this, it visibly relaxed, slithering towards Harry and perching on his knee.

Said Parselmouth turned to Neville, smiling slightly at the dumbstruck expression on the boy's face.

"It's okay." he reassured. "He won't bite you. Not while I'm here, at least." Turning back to the cobra, he inquired, " _Do you have a name? Something I could call you by?_"

"_Seth, master._" it curled over into what could be called almost a bow at this. "_It is an honor to be in your presence._"

Harry frowned.

"_...Stop it. Call me Harry, not master._"

Seth blinked, looking up at him in shock.

"_...but you are a speaker. It is only propriety that I address you thus._"

Harry sighed, shaking his head.

"_Well, 'master' feels uncomfortable with that name. Please call me Harry._" at the obvious reluctance that the snake had, he belatedly thought of one way to fix this name thing. "_-Alright, call me Harry- that's an order. Do you understand? _"

Seth bobbed his head up and down.

"_Of coarse, Master Harry._"

He blinked, opening his mouth, only to shut it with a resigned snap.

"_...better, but... well, it doesn't matter too much. Listen, Seth, I have something to ask you... _"

The cobra appeared to brighten up at the prospect of being able to assist his 'Master'.

"_What is it, Master Harry?_"

Harry winced at the title once more, but forced himself to ignore it. There were more important things to do right now.

"_How much do you know about Speakers...?_"

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Yeah, okay. There it is. Have at it, then.

...you know, this is actually mostly fueled by a cross of Voltaire music (The _hell_ is up with Headless Waltz, anyways?) and being bored with a pencil in hand. I started drawing someone, and they morphed into Harry wearing a really strange white tunic-like robe... and when I was done, my brain had planned out this whole damn story.

I don't get it. My brain doesn't really follow my commands. ...let alone anything _close_ to being called 'rules of logic' and/or 'sanity'.

So have fun while you can. I don't know how long I can keep writing before the white-coats come to drag me back to their nice little padded room. Until then, see ya.


	2. Chapter 2

Nah na na na Banana.

I _still_ don't know what's going on in my brain. Whatever. Just enjoy what you can and ignore what you can't...

Still don't own Harry Potter! Damn!

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For the next few days, Harry was feeling more and more cheerful. Lunch and dinner were no longer either lonely or trying events- he would simply take his meals in the tower and bring out Seth for company. Neville was taking his job more seriously than Harry could have ever imagined- he kept feeling eyes watching him between classes, and when he turned around, his friend would be there, eyebrow raised as though to say 'are you crazy yet?'.

But he wasn't. And he was grateful for that.

He wasn't ready to _completely_ throw away all the information in the book, however- it may just have been his imagination, but Harry kept feeling like things were getting easier for him. On the first day of that week he had been completely hopeless at their latest transfiguration assignment (changing a pebble into a quill), and yet... now it made perfect sense. No- _more_ than perfect sense. It was as though for the first time in his life, he wasn't just following the instructions and hoping things would happen. He_ understood_ it.

There had to be enough mass in the pebble to equate to the mass of the quill. If you made the quill too big, it wouldn't work. It had to be small and elegant- but to do that, you needed to be practically an artist.

But he'd managed it. And once he realized just how significant that was, he was quite proud of it.

...however, it hadn't made anything different on a basic level.

People were still avoiding him. Treating him like a monster. And even though he had hoped that his newfound abilities would have made up for that... they didn't.

Hermione was his friend. She was in the hospital wing, unable to move, think, or do anything.

Neville was his friend. Harry himself had forced the boy to be his confidant and executioner all at once. He doubted they would ever think of one another the same way again.

And Ron...

Ron was worrying him.

He needed Hermione- Harry didn't need his new insight to understand that. The three of them were like a pyramid, three sides leaning on each other in unison. But when you took one of those walls out... well, the other two didn't stand up too well.

They needed Hermione back and _fast_. Ron was already falling apart at the seams. Harry's own new hobby was nothing more than a small patch to repair the fraying that had already occurred to him.

Seth helped, he had to admit. He was swiftly coming to rely on his daily conversations with the cobra. Not only did Seth seem to be what could be considered a highly intelligent individual, but he could be unexpectedly compassionate when Harry felt like he just wanted to cry himself to sleep.

Never before would Harry have considered sleeping with a snake around your neck to be a cure for insomnia and depression at the same time. But with his new mental epiphany, he had come to accept that many of the things he had taken for granted were completely false.

It all boiled down to art, in the end. Every class he was taken was an art in its own way. From the incredibly subtle precision of potions to the wide-sweeping and general application of charms.

All the classes gave you a skill, and every skill was a different brush that a talented artist could use to paint their masterpiece.

That artist just needed some paint.

He couldn't figure out what it was that he was missing- he knew that his theory was correct, but he couldn't figure out what to use as his paint. In other, more plain words... he wanted to know where magic came from. He wanted to know how it came into being so he could control what colors he was painting with- to make his artwork complete.

That was what found him wandering through the halls after dinner but before curfew, looking for a professor he never would have thought to ask about this sort of thing before, heading towards the place that Seth, who had done a little snooping for him, had told him that his head of house's office was located in.

As opposed to most professors, whose offices were located behind or near their classrooms, his transfiguration teacher's room was far on the other side of the castle. It was a long and tedious walk there, filled with twisting passages and glares from students who were still out at that hour. When he finally reached the door that Seth had told him McGonigall's office was behind, he knocked twice, trying to be polite.

Footsteps. ...then the door clicked open, and Harry came face to face with the one person he both wanted to see most and was most scared of talking to at that moment. Except for maybe Dumbledore...

His head of house herself.

"Potter?" she inquired, eyebrows receding to her hairline. "My goodness boy- what are you doing here?"

"...I wanted to see you, professor." he mumbled, looking at his feet. He felt rather stupid now that he was here- knowing that he was going to make a fool of himself in front of his head of house. "I needed to... ask you something."

She looked at him for a moment, studying everything from the depressed and embarrassed look on his face to the slouch of his shoulders. At last she nodded, beckoning him in.  
As she steered him into a chair, Harry glanced around the office. It was like his transfiguration teacher had simply imposed her personality on the room instead of decorating- everything was in shades of red and gold, and the elegant mahogany wood paneling of the walls reminded Harry strongly of the woman's strong personality. She sat down across from him in another chair, taking the initiative.

"I assume this is not about school work, Potter." she began, "And unless you came here simply to admire the scenery, I'd like to ask you if you need to talk about anything."  
...he actually considered it for a moment. A teacher. A teacher that might be able to help him... might know more about his predicament. ...but then he pushed it gently aside.

He had Neville to look out for him. Students had always proved more reliable than teachers before, so he had no reason to change his mind now...

"...I know what you're thinking, but really... I'm fine." he brushed it off, turning to the main reason he had come. "It's just... I had a question, professor. About magic."

"By all means, Potter- ask it." she nodded. He frowned, lost in thought for a moment.

"...if I let you in on a... metaphor I've been working with, then it'll make this easier." he finally agreed in his mind that this would be useful- to let a fully grown adult in on his theory to test it out. "I've been trying to figure out how magic really _works_... what it actually _is_. I keep thinking about the connection between a wand, a spell, and the effect, and... well... I just sort of felt like it would be easiest to explain to _you_."

"Go on, Potter." she seemed almost pleased at that. Harry _had_ always been a bit distant from any of the adults... it didn't really seem like he trusted authority figures. "Let's hear what you've come up with."

"...it's like painting, in a way." he worked it out in his mind- how to phrase it. He hadn't put words to his idea this whole time, but now that he had them, it all made sense. "Wand, spell, effect. A spell's like a paintbrush- different spells for different sorts of brush strokes across the paper... paper being the world around us in this case. The wand's like the hand that holds the brush because it can hold as many as needed, and the effect's like the stripe of paint afterwards. I just have one question... what's the _paint?_"

There was a silence while McGonigall digested that idea. Harry rushed to explain what he meant, worried that she wouldn't understand.

"...I ...guess what I mean is... what is it that lets us do magic? Most Muggles can't do it, right? But Wizards can't without their wands, so... our 'paint'... are we taking the magic from some other source, or is it inside... us?"

"...I have to admit, Potter... in the current circumstances, I'm pleasantly surprised you've come up with such an advanced question." she stared him down, face looking more gentle than it had been before. Harry smiled weakly, looking to his knees.

"...well... you know... when no one wants to talk to you, you've got to find something to do with your spare time..."

"I understand, but that isn't what I meant." she stood, walking over to him and standing beside his chair. For what may have been the first time, he thought he might have seen a _real_ smile on her face. "...Mr. Potter... you do not cease to amaze me. At first I thought you had come here to ask me to move you out of Gryffindor tower into a private room so you might get a small bit of peace... or to interrogate me on the existence of the Chamber of Secrets so you might go on some foolhardy search for it. But instead, I find that you've taken a situation such as this and used your time thinking up a theory far beyond even seventh year level...? Well done, Mr. Potter. Well done."

Harry looked back to his knees, embarrassed at the praise. He knew he should probably get used to it if he was really going to go farther into his Parselmouth- it was supposed to open up the blocks on his mind, so he was likely going to get praised a lot for sharing things he had just thought up as a spur of the moment idea... all the same, it felt... really nice to be treated warmly after everyone had been looking at him like a monster for weeks...

"...t ...thanks, Professor." he mumbled. She stood back, observing him for a moment before speaking up.

"In your own words, our 'paint'... it does come from inside us." she walked over to her desk, picking up a sheet of blank paper and a quill and bringing them back so she could diagram it for him. "The wand's core has magic too, and that's what most Wizards draw their spells from. They rely on the wand, sending a spark of their own magic into it so they can reawaken the sleeping magic inside. We use the wand..." she pulled out her own, showing it to him. "...because if we didn't, we would eventually become exhausted after casting many spells in a row. However, with the wand we are using only the most minute amount of our own power in order to cause the magical core to react, sending out a spell."

"...but then..." he murmured, staring at her wand with a frown. "...does that mean that we _can_ cast magic without wands?"

"Eliminate the brush in your theory and you get Finger-Painting." she shrugged, pocketing the wand again. "You can do it, but it's not as precise and causes a huge mess in the end... and uses up your paint a lot faster. If you ever get caught without your wand you may wish to know how to use it, but otherwise you should stick to manifesting your spells from an alternate source than your own body. It's also taxing on the individual using it- many people who have attempted wandless magic have ended up in St. Mungos long-term ward because of the backlash. Do not try it unless you are in a particularly dangerous situation with no hope of getting your wand back."

"...alright." he nodded, beginning to understand. "But then does that also mean we don't have to use_ wands?_" at her quirked eyebrow, he continued. "I mean... I have a phoenix feather in my wand. If I took out the phoenix feather and left the wood behind, would I still be able to cast spells with just the feather?"

"...that would be akin to... pulling the bristles out of your paintbrush and trying to hold them in your bare hand." she frowned, eyes silently scolding him for even considering destroying his wand in such a way. "Barely any more precise than wandless magic and _much_ more messy. I would rather you go _without_ a wand rather than attempting something like that."

He sat back, considering that. He had learned so much that night... but he still had one more thing on his mind.

"...could I ask... one more question?" when she nodded encouragingly, he wondered out loud, "...I'm just thinking... is it possible to insert a magical core into... not a wand? Like if you took... I don't know- let's just say a phoenix feather. If you took a phoenix feather and crushed it into powder, but put that powder in your gloves... would your gloves work as a wand?"

McGonigall opened her mouth, but then shut it again, deep in thought. He could tell by her expression that she didn't truly know the answer...

"...you don't know... do you." it was more of a statement than a question. McGonigall shook her head.

"You are correct. I... truly don't know if magical cores would work outside of wood. I know that certain canes and staffs hold magical cores... but never a material such as stone or metal, and never outside of the same shape- canes, staffs, and wands are all shaped roughly the same... if in different sizes."

Harry nodded. She had helped so much, but it made sense that there was a limit to even her knowledge. Just as he was about to thank her and leave... she put a hand on his shoulder, causing him to look up into her eyes curiously. She had an amused glint in them, seemingly quite pleased with him.

"...Professor...?"

"...Mr. Potter, I assume from you spoke of your current predicament that you don't have much to do at the moment?"

"Er... that's about the sum of it. Why?" She nodded once, almost like she was confirming it to herself.

"...that should work then... I would like to ask you something. Would you like to discover the answer to your last question for me?" when he looked at her strangely, she elaborated. "I will make sure you are given extra credit for this year if you could possibly take the time out of your schedule in order to try and create a nontraditional magical implementation source."

"...in other words..." he blinked, trying to translate what she had just said. "...you want me to... see if materials other than wood and shapes other than a basic stick can be used in place of a wand?" even without really meaning to, he had already formulated an idea for what he might want to make. It was an interesting idea... a _very_ interesting one. And he could do the tedious work while he was focusing on trying to figure out how to solve his current problem, and do the work that you needed to devote your whole attention to when he wanted to numb out bad things people had said that day... "...and I would get... credit for it?"

"Not only that Mr. Potter, but if you managed this, it would be a revolutionary concept. You might even get rewarded with an Order of Merlin for contributions to Wizarding society... maybe not first class, but you might be able to..." she paused here, almost like she was trying to figure out how to say this. "...if you dedicated yourself to this, you might be able to get your name known for discoveries that revolutionized our world... instead of for being the boy who lived."

It was like his brain stopped right there.

...he had never thought of _that_ before. ...but it would... it would_ work_, wouldn't it? If he made a definite positive contribution to the society as a whole, he might be able to work past people's instinctive fear of Parselmouthes... maybe even past his 'grand title' itself. He would never be able to work past his fame... but maybe he could become famous for something he did _himself_ instead of something that happened when he was so young that he couldn't remember it. Instead of being just a figurehead, he could be a real _person_ in their eyes...

"...I'll do it." he finally agreed, mind already racing. He would have to keep track of what was going on in school along with working out his little mystery _and_ creating this, but he felt like he could manage it... "But I'll probably need a lot of things... materials, a place to work..."

"I'll pull a few strings. I'm sure the headmaster would be delighted, and the other teachers-"

"No, please don't tell them." he looked up at her, smiling for real for the first time in quite a while. "I don't want to get their hopes up in case I can't do it... but... if I can, then..." he swallowed heavily, taking a deep breath. "...then I still don't want them to know until it's finished. Just between us, if Professor Snape found out... well... and besides, can you imagine what _Lockhart_ might do?" knowing full well that his head of house truly disliked the man, he found himself doing an imitation of the pompous peacock without really realizing it. "Oh Harry, don't worry about a thing, together our _fame_ will get your little project finished! See?" he mimed picking something up, baring his teeth at it like he was brandishing a knife. "My smile isn't making it work! Oh woe is me, it'll never be finished!" he pretended to drop what he was holding, blinking twice. "Oh, sorry about that Harry. Well, no hard feelings! You can just make another, right? Harry? Wait, why are you locking me in a broom cupboard? Where are you going? Wait a tic for me, chap!_ Harry?_"

Apparently, it had been the right thing to do. His head of house had hidden her mouth behind her hand, obviously trying to hide her smile, but he could tell she had liked his skit by the creasing of her eyes.

"...I think I understand your dilemma." she admitted after a moment, still forced to hide her amused expression at the thought of Harry shutting Lockhart in a closet until the school year was over. "Very well- it'll be our secret until you've sorted it out. I have authority over a small collection of laboratories on the sixth floor. This year and next year I'll make sure you have a place to work. And yes, I'll make sure that your work is well protected- I may be able to station a portrait there if you like..."

"Thank you so much, Professor!" Harry was ecstatic at the new development. This was _perfect_- now he had a place he could go where _no one _would bother him! Everywhere else in the school had the looming threat that someone would just walk in on him, but there... he could work in peace and quiet.

It was _perfect_.

"Go on then Mr. Potter- off with you. Go back to bed before curfew sets in." she shooed him off before he could get too excited. "If you'd like to make a list of materials you'd like to start with, bring it to me and I'll get them for you. Now _good night_." she made a movement with her hands like she was dismissing him, not wanting to be thanked overly much for what she was doing. He deserved it, she figured- not only for what everyone in the school was doing to him, but also because of that inherent _intelligence_ that she seemed to have glossed over so _easily_ at first glance. He had seemed to be a quiet, unassuming boy with a talent for flying. Other than that, she had found his school work to be satisfactory at _best_... not of the level which he had just presented himself as.

This was her apology to him. She had thought him to be an ordinary boy, preferring to play and talk with his friends rather than think too much or study.

It seemed... like she had underestimated him _greatly_.

As he was about to walk out, he paused a moment in the doorway, turning his head just enough to throw a comment over his shoulder to her.

"...I'll do my very best, Professor. Thank you."

And so he would. Shutting the door behind him, he took a deep breath, smiling gratefully. He needed a place to relax, and this whole project was just the way to do it. He already knew what he wanted to make, too- it was only a question of how to combine the materials...

Hurrying back to the common room, he bumped into a few people on the way but they steered clear of him, preferring to leave him to his own devices lest they be caught in his 'wrath' along with the Muggle-born students. Giving a rushed password to the portrait of the fat lady, he ignored the looks he was getting from the rest of his house and walked straight up to Ron and Neville, sitting down next to Ron. The redhead looked at him sideways, more sullen than normal.

"Where you been all night, mate?" he asked, looking back into the fire. "Didn't realize you'd wandered off after dinner..."

"Yeah, Harry." Fred was on his left in an instant, George scooting in on his right. "We were wondering where you went."

"So how many bodies will there be tomorrow, Harry?" the other one teased, grinning. Harry's good mood fell, and he pushed the twins away moodily.

"...stop it. Don't joke about that sort of thing..." he trailed off, noticing that the rest of the common room had gone peculiarly quiet, listening in on their conversation. It was Pavati Patil that finally managed to muster the courage to walk up to him, staring him down.

"Where were you all night, Harry?" she asked, voice wavering a little bit. Harry blinked, eyes narrowing a little bit.

"...I don't see why it's any of your business." he replied. She glared at him.

"I have Muggle-born _friends_ here, Harry." he winced at that. "I think we all have a right to know what you're up to these days."

There was a silence. Neville and Ron looked like they were ready to jump to his defense, but they soon found that they didn't have to.

Harry stared back up at her, green eyes meeting her own brown with a silent intensity that she couldn't match. She took a step back, but she stopped as he began to speak.

"...I was talking with Professor McGonigall." he muttered, glaring at her. She raised an eyebrow, still holding strong in the face of his boiling fury.

"And afterwards?"

"Afterwards _what?_" he gaped at her in shock. "You mean what did I do_ after_ I spent _all the time_ talking with the Professor? I walked _back_ here- in a _good mood_ until _you_ started talking to me!"

"We have a right to know-" she started, but she quickly backed off with her eyes wide as he stood up, a silent fury washing off of him in waves.

"You have _nothing._" he hissed, his anger almost palpable. "You have no _right_ to interrogate me simply because I am a Parselmouth. You have no _right_ to know what I do with _my_ spare time. You have no _right_ to treat me like a... a criminal! No... I'm not even a criminal to you, am I? I'm just some monster that you have the _right_ to treat horribly because you're all _normal_ and I'm _not_, isn't that right? Don't you even _dare_ deny it. You think you have the _right_ to treat me like the next dark lord because I'm just _different_ than you. What gives you that _right?_ What makes you so _special_ that the rest of the world can just go lick your boots?" he shook his head, disgusted. "...you all... you're no better than the rest of the wizards with their _Pureblood mania_. Just like a... a group of _Slytherin_." He turned to Neville and Ron, still trembling from the energy he had put into his speech. They were both staring at him in awe, and he spoke to them rather brokenly. "...I ...can't stay here right now, guys. I'm sorry... I just can't... these _people_..."

"It's okay, Mate." Ron stood up at once, joining him on his left side. "Don't worry about it. Rather be with you than _them_, anyways." Neville nodded, walking over to his right.

"Got that right." he muttered, shooting their house a scolding look like he was utterly disappointed with them. "Lets go, Harry."

He let them lead him away from the common room without really paying attention to where he was going. He felt... drained. Like he could have slept for a week after his outburst. He knew it would be all over the school by tomorrow, likely in about a million different flavors of rumor, but until then he just wanted a break.

He didn't really realize where he had been brought until he was sat down, and even then it took a second to make out where they were.

It was the empty classroom Neville had brought him to before. The boy had probably thought it would help to calm him down since he had already resolved an emotional moment there... or something.

All he could think to do was to slump down out of the chair and allow himself to fall to the ground, clutching onto it like it was a lifeline. He might have started crying again, but he felt... empty. Ron knelt down next to him, putting a hand on his shoulder in concern.

"You okay, mate? You look... not good."

His hand was real. It was there, physical and actually there and pressing against him reassuringly. But even despite that, he couldn't actually feel it- could only feel the pain in his chest at having been utterly and totally estranged from the people he had thought would be _different_- that were his _friends_.

"...it's painless... right?" he asked, dully. He couldn't really see anything beyond the haze of his emotional anguish, so he didn't know what Ron's and Neville's expressions were. "Suicide, I mean? It's not supposed to hurt...?"

Next thing he knew, he had been pulled upright and slapped across the face. He found himself staring into the faces of one very shocked Ron and one _very_ angry Neville, hand still raised in post-slapping position.

"Don't you even _say_ that." he demanded, and Harry suddenly felt very small in the path of what he had apparently found himself facing down. "Don't even let yourself _think_ about it. Merlin- asking something like that! Your parents would be ashamed of you for even _considering_ it!"

"...my parents never had to deal with every student in the school coming up behind them with a knife in hand..." he drifted off again, curling up against his knees. Ron slowly sat down next to him, making sure Harry knew he was there before he spoke.

"...Mate... they don't even have a clue what they're talking about. When we prove you're innocent they're going to be begging you for forgiveness..."

"I'm not giving it to them." he answered instantly, and both of them turned to stare at him in shock. His green eyes were cutting a hole into the wood of the desk leg in front of him. "Wizards have to realize that not _everything_ can just be fixed like magic. Sometimes when you break something, you can't just cast '_reparo'_ and make it good again just like that. They treat _everything_ like that- make a mistake and instantly think that it can be fixed with a flick of their wand. I _trusted_ them. I thought they were my _friends_. Well you know what? Some things can't just be forgiven with a snap of your fingers. They don't understand that when they come up to me and say 'no hard feelings, right?'... I'm going to say '_go piss off you bloody git_'. Those arrogant, spoiled, snotty, insufferable little..."

"...Mate..." Ron was staring at him with wide eyes. "...you're ...not going to forgive them?"

Harry shook his head.

"..._none_ of them?" he wondered, stunned. Harry turned his dead eyes onto Ron, really looking at him for a second.

Ron looked like he hadn't brushed his hair in days. There were dark circles under his eyes and he looked pale and tired. He was... fraying. Just like Harry...

"...this is all... _wrong_." he murmured, ignoring the last question. "...this whole year... it wasn't supposed to be this way. We need..." he sought around for something to latch his mind on to, and finally realized what would make everything better in the end. "...we need... mandrakes. We need them to mature. We need..."

"...we need Hermione." Ron finished, apparently having realized where Harry's mind was going with this. "We need her harping on at us about school and reading a book in the stands when we go flying. We need her back."

He nodded silently.

The three boys sat together for a long time, Ron on Harry's left and Neville on his right with their shoulders pressed up together. The warmth from either side was soothing his frazzled nerves, and at long last he fell asleep right where he was, head flopped comfortably onto Ron's shoulder.

It had been far too long of a day... and far too much had happened. All the same... he was glad to know he still had _true_ friends.

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I know... too many people like this. Too many broken children who wanted or still want to take their own lives. There's one in particular that caught my interest. She's the sort of person who was far too suicidal in her youth to be anything but cheerful now to make up for it. But all the cheer in the world couldn't make up for the fact that she still wanted to die when she was little, and there's the damage on her wrists to prove it. I believe she was... nine when she found the razor. To this day she's still nonchalant about it and wears her scars proudly, each inch of healed skin a tribute to the fact that she once nearly took her own life and yet now has found something to live for.

There are some people whom Suicide makes uncomfortable. ...there are others who just know far too much of it... whose friends and family have done things to themselves that others would shudder at the thought of. People who've grown so used to it that it feels strange to know someone who _hasn't_ tried, or at least _considered_ killing themselves.

I'm not one of the first kind. So leave Harry to what little peace he can get. ...while he still can...


	3. Chapter 3

Don't own Harry Potter, see? Yeah... need to take a nap now. Bigtime... (falls asleep)

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The next morning Harry woke up in what may have been the most utterly embarrassing situation possible. While a small portion of his mind and heart jumped at the thought that Ron and Neville still liked him enough to stay with him through the night, the other parts of his brain began directing the blood to rush to his face immediately.

His head had ended up on Ron's stomach, and the redhead had curled up with a table leg like it was a stuffed animal. Harry himself had somehow managed to end up sandwiched between Ron and Neville, who was currently draped halfway over Harry's legs. To make the entire situation all the worse, Seth had apparently smelled out where his master had gotten off to in the middle of the night and followed him, wrapping itself around his neck like an overly affectionate necktie. ...a _poisonous_ overly affectionate necktie, he had to remind himself- Seth should be instructed _not _to introduce his fangs to Harry's friends...

"...mmph... huh...?" Neville's head slowly lifted from Harry's knees, glancing around a moment to figure out where they were. When he did, he turned to see his raven-haired friend staring at him from behind wide-rimmed glasses, stroking a scaly necklace that seemed to have migrated to his throat when the boys had been asleep.

Harry and Neville stared at one another for a moment, both of them trying to distinguish whether they should express embarrassment or comfort until Neville spoke up.

"...your legs make good pillows." he managed to get out, and Harry allowed himself a half smile. Neville was going for being comfortable with him rather than awkward, then. That made him feel happy. Then, he turned away, closing his eyes.

"...you aren't wondering?" he asked, quietly. It had been bugging him...

"Wondering?" Neville blinked, not knowing what he meant. "Wondering what, Harry?"

"...if I'm evil or not?" the Boy Who Lived made no move to curl up on himself like he had the night before, but Neville was fairly sure he would have if the movement wouldn't have woken up their third companion. "From... how I was last night. You're not wondering if I'm evil yet or not?"

Blue met green... and Neville sat up, moving over to sit next to Harry's side with a gentle smile on his face.

"...I don't think so." he whispered, glancing over to Ron to make sure he wasn't awake. When the boy was reassured that the Weasley really _was_ fast asleep, he turned back to Harry. "It's human to get mad, right? I'd have been more worried if you had just taken it without a word... and..." he glanced to the floor, shoulders brought up to his chin. "...even if you were... a little scary back then... even if the reason why you aren't going to forgive anyone is because you're practicing Parseltongue... even if you feel like you want to kill yourself and it's all because you're going crazy... you aren't going dark. It doesn't have anything to do with your Parseltongue- anyone would feel like that in this situation, right? I know you're not going insane, and I _know_ it's working." When Harry looked at him, stunned, the other boy just managed a weak smile. "...well... I don't think anyone else noticed it, really... but I need to watch you to make sure you're okay, right? So I was looking at some of the spells you've been casting since you summoned your friend, and... well..."

"...I know I'm getting better." Harry sighed, glancing down at the snake around his neck. "Talking with Seth... it's helped _so_ much. Removing blocks on your mind... that's really the only way to describe it. But... I mean..." he drifted off, glaring hatefully at one of the desks. "...you know how the book said that Parselmouthes... how we're supposed to go evil?" Neville nodded, and Harry took a deep breath, finally putting words to what he had been wondering all along. "...I think... I'm beginning to think that it might have been... because everyone _treated_ them so badly. I know that if this went on for the rest of my life, I'd just... snap one day and try dark magic on someone. Probably. Maybe. I don't know- maybe I'm already crazy and I just can't tell..."

Neville shrugged up against his shoulder, huddled in the small amount of warmth he could glean from the other two boys. It was _cold_ in there.

"...Harry? Can I... say something?"

The raven haired boy nodded. Neville was shy. If he wanted to speak his mind, Harry wanted to encourage it.

"Go ahead, Nev. What is it?"

"...I'm s... sorry."

"You're... what?" he asked, frowning slightly at the head of sandy brown hair next to him. Neville shuddered.

"I'm _sorry_, okay? F... for everything that we've done to you. All us students. I know you didn't _have_ to do all you did when you saved Justin, but we're all... treating you like... a horrible person for it anyways. You're trying to help us, and we're just sort of... you know... dragging you through the mud." he finished, looking like it had taken quite a bit of guts to say that.

Harry was silent a moment. ...then, he reached up and put a hand on the top of his companion's head, refusing to look at him.

"...if you _seriously_ think that you need to apologize for _them_, then you _should_ say sorry. Neville...you _stupid_ little Lion. You don't have to group yourself in with them... you don't have to petition for my forgiveness. We're friends, right?" he smiled weakly at the other boy, his eyes looking tired and older than any twelve-year-olds eyes had a right to look. But even through that, there was a glimmering affection that didn't seem to dwell in anyone else's eyes that he had ever seen before...

Neville sat back silently, abruptly realizing what he had actually done. To him, it had been nothing more than comforting a friend when they were in a bad spot. The promise to look out for him had meant a little more to Neville, but when it had dawned on him that Harry was practicing Parseltongue so he could _save_ all of them, hated or not, he agreed immediately. ...but now... Harry was showing what he _meant_ when he said the word 'friend', and it was _much_ different than Neville's definition of it.

When Neville said it, he was referring to someone who had been friendly with him. He was such a klutz that most people, Gryffindor included, just made fun of him- so when someone was honestly nice towards him, he called them his friends. He said it almost meaninglessly, referring to a large group of the student population when he spoke the word.

Harry... was different.

He... really _meant_ the word, didn't he? Neville had always wondered how he, Ron, and Hermione could be so _close_. They clustered themselves together when they walked, when they talked, when they did homework, when they played... they seemed to know all of one-another's quirks and love every single one of them. When he had wondered about it before, Neville had come to the conclusion that it was Ron and Hermione that were pulling them closer together- Hermione was a Muggle-born and might have subconsciously needed a human shield against their _weird_ society which the other two provided, and Ron had grown up with so many siblings that he had likely just automatically integrated Harry and Hermione into the category of 'Family' without a second thought.

...but now he realized he had been mistaken. Sure, those two factors probably held a great amount of influence over the final product- their amazingly close friendship in this case- but now he had figured out that he had overlooked the _real_ reason why they were more like family than friends.

It was _Harry_.

When he said the word 'friend', he didn't mean it like Neville did. When he used the word friend, he meant someone _very_ close... _very_ precious to him. An addictive and dedicated familiarity that simple school children couldn't really begin to comprehend, with their chaotically changing cliques and groups. No- this concept of friendship in Harry's eyes... it was more like _love_ than anything else. Not in the romantic sense, but a love that didn't have words to describe it. A beautiful, never-ending euphoria of being so comfortable around a person that there simply _was nothing left_ to keep them apart.

It had probably been developed from the fact that Harry had been abused as a child, Neville realized belatedly. For a boy who had no lost love for his family, he had taken to the people who cared for him like they were a part of his own soul, unwittingly both offering a sort of friendship that no other person would ever be able to offer them and also _taking_ from them a sort of shield- a bubble against the outside forces that he _didn't_ want to have to deal with. He would give them his love. In return, he just needed a place for his beaten mind to be able to retreat back to when he couldn't handle the world anymore.

That was... what he had unknowingly stepped into. Harry thought of him as a _friend_ in _his_ concept of the word, not on Neville's level of comprehension of it. He had offered dorky, klutzy, _awkward_ Neville Longbottom- a boy who, by all rights, should have been a Hufflepuff- the boy who couldn't do _anything_ right... and accepted him as a _friend_. Not by the weak definition that normal people used, but by the definition that meant that you were one of the most precious people to him in his life.

"...what's wrong?" Harry whispered, trying to keep his voice down for fear of waking Ron. "Something on your mind?" Honest to Merlin concern shone in his eyes, and Neville shook his head to clear it.

"...nothing." he smiled gently back. "I'm just... worried for my friend, you know? How you holding up, Harry?"

Friend. Neville was worried for his friend. ...that was what Harry needed right now. A _friend-_ not by the weak definition. Ron would always be there for him, but Neville had been offered the same thing that the redhead had been gifted with. ...and he was going to accept.

"...I'm..." he trailed off, staring off into some distant point that his companion couldn't see. "...better." he finally admitted. "I... guess I remembered something when I woke up... saw you guys had stayed with me." he turned back with a weak smile, glancing up into Neville's eyes. "...the whole school might be... you know... I might hate the lot of them, but that doesn't mean I'm completely alone, right? You guys... stuck with me. And you're both Purebloods, too... no offense- I didn't mean it that way." he held up his hands in defense, but Neville shook his head.

"No, I get it. We've been raised hearing stories about how bad Parselmouthes are, so you... thought we would be the ones most likely to leave you?"

He had hit the nail on the head. Harry nodded, looking slightly ashamed.

"...I know it's horrible for me to have considered it..."

"But it isn't." his brown-haired companion interrupted him, putting an arm gently around Harry's shoulders. This was the comfort zone that the Boy Who Lived needed Neville to be in if he was to ever recover from the sudden betrayal of the entire school body. "It isn't horrible at all, Harry. You were hurt so bad- you just didn't want to keep your hopes up in case it turned out we _would_ have thought that way."

"...yeah." a quiet mumble came from behind them, and both boys turned to the side to glance at Ron in surprise. His eyes were half open.

"Ron?" Harry blinked. "How long have you been awake?"

"...not long. But I heard your Pureblood thing, mate." he shrugged, not really seeming inclined to get up. Both boys were glad- he was acting as somewhat of a blanket to them, since they were practically leaning on him. Undoubtedly they would have lost any warmth any of the three had managed to gather should the redhead have tried to relocate himself.

"...and?" Harry looked away, scrunching up his shoulders to his chin. "Are you mad?"

"...nah." the redhead closed his eyes, relaxing a little bit. "...but you gotta remember, mate... we're with you, right? If it's you 'gainst them, we're not sticking with them. You're my best mate, right? Ever since the train first year. So don't you _dare_ think we're gunna leave you hanging. You'd probably go through with that stupid half-formed scheme to kill yourself."

That shut them all up. Harry stared at his feet, and Ron and Neville kept their eyes focused solely on their third companion. At last, Neville steeled himself to ask.

"...were you... really considering it?" it was a quiet voice he spoke in. It had been something he had dreaded since he had connected the dots that Harry's home life was less than comfortable. Neville had only ever known one person who had been abused when he was little- and she had succeeded in killing herself when they were nine. Knowing that Harry was following that same path wasn't the most comforting notion.

"...yes... no. I don't know- maybe...?" he whispered, staring at his hands. "...Hogwarts is... it's my home. I always thought... I'd be fine- I could put up with the summers... if only I had this place to look forward to..." he clenched those same hands into fists, closing his eyes. "...but if Hogwarts is going to be like this... if everyone treats me like a monster for the rest of my life, then..."

"Don't finish that sentence." Neville flinched at what Harry was about to say. Ron nodded.

"Yeah, Mate. Come stay with me over the summer. We can hang out every day and you never have to see those bloody rotten Muggles again."

"...Ron..." a weak smile was on his face. "...I'm sorry, but... you know your mum and dad follow Dumbledore's instructions. He's the one that keeps me there... 'blood wards' or something. They'd never go for it."

Ron winced, fully aware of the fact that his parents were, for lack of a better word, 'In Dumbledore's Pocket'. He shrugged uncomfortably.

"...I dunno, mate. Mum was hounding Dumbledore to let you stay through last summer. But I guess he has a reason for it, huh?"

"...yeah..." Harry drifted off, eyes growing slightly hopeless. "...a reason for it..."

"Come on." Neville interrupted, not wanting to let Harry have too much time to dwell on whatever thoughts were making him so sad. "Breakfast soon, right? Let's go catch a bite before the crowd comes to stuff themselves."

Both boys murmured their assent, and they finally dislodged from one another, all of them shifting their robes around in an attempt to conserve some of the warmth they had just lost. It was a tribute to the fact that they were so comfortable with one another that they drew together for more protection against the early morning chill of the castle. They had spent the night curled up together- it wasn't as if they were about to become suddenly shy _now_. As they made their way down to the great hall, Neville frowned nervously.

"...you think we'll get in trouble for not getting back to the common room?" he asked, quietly. Ron winced, but Harry shook his head.

"We won't. The only people who could have reported us are the Gryffindor students, and they wouldn't have complained at a night of not having to be around me. Even if they did, they would have complained to McGonigall, who would have asked for the full story. _They_ would get in trouble- not _us_. The teachers are mostly fair concerning people who run away from their houses for a night or two- it's only when they do things _during_ the night that they get in trouble."

Ron blinked.

"...you sounded like Hermione for a sec, Mate." he stated, eyebrows raised. Neville couldn't help but allow himself a small laugh at that.

"...You... kind of did..."

Harry blinked, but seemed to brush it off with an embarrassed shrug. Ron frowned, wondering.

"...but Mate, how d'ya know McGonigall wouldn't be mad? She wouldn't take points from her own house, but she might give us detention..."

"Nah." he shook his head again. "I went to see her yesterday, remember? She was acting like she thought I was going to ask for somewhere else to sleep anyways. If it comes up, I'll deal with her. Don't worry, I won't let you two get in trouble for it."

It sounded very final, and Neville was grateful that Ron- who one had to admit could be rather dense some days- tactfully changed the subject.

"Why'd you go see her yesterday anyways, Mate? Needed something?"

"...I guess, yeah." he shrugged, sighing. "It was... weird. I don't know how to really describe what happened- one minute I walked through the door with a question about where magic came from, and no more than twenty minutes later I walked back out with more information than you could fill the common room with and a new pet project that she's promised to help with. It was really helpful, really confusing, and _really_ hard to keep up with. I don't even really get half of what happened."

"But you got the answer to your question, right?" Neville asked. When Harry nodded, Ron spoke up.

"What'd she hook you into, Mate? Extra homework?" he winced. The Boy Who Lived frowned, eyebrow raised.

"...uh... I don't really know how to describe it. It isn't something like extra homework, though- I actually _want_ to do this. It's just... a little difficult to figure out how I'm going to actually make it. Neither of you know anything about how wands work, do you...?" when they both shook their heads sheepishly, Harry waved it off. "Didn't think so. Might have helped, but I suppose this works better."

"What're you making, Mate?" the redhead inquired, a lopsided grin on his face at the idea of Harry taking on _more_ work. "A wand?"

"...well... _sort_ of." he commented, obviously perplexed as to how to explain it. "...it's more like a... she wants me to make a wand _without_ making a wand... in a way."

Absolute silence. ...then, Neville spoke up.

"...I think you lost us." he commented, amused. With what Harry was doing to his brain by practicing Parseltongue, he wasn't surprised that the boy was taking on some form of project that neither of them would be able to understand, even if he explained it to them in the simplest terms he could. Harry shook his head with a sigh, slightly amused.

"...oh never mind. You'll get what I'm trying to say when I'm done with it. Until then- it's our little secret, okay? I don't want Malfoy... or _Snape_ hearing what I'm up to." Both Gryffindor boys shuddered at the sudden scene playing out in their heads of either of the aforementioned gits coming across Harry's hard work and smashing it back to square one. Ron, though, couldn't help but be curious.

"Can't you give us just a little hint, Mate? What it's supposed to be?"

"I can, but..." he trailed off, wondering. "...well... it's hard. Let me see if I can explain... I'm going to make something like a wand that you use like a wand, but it isn't shaped anything like a wand. Sort of like someone taking a broom and turning it into a pair of wings in order to fly instead. Serves the same purpose, but in a different shape and with a whole new set of mechanics involved. Get it?"

"...not really." Neville admitted, Ron's face conveying his own incomprehension. "But I think I get what you meant by the fact that it was confusing."

"Yeah, Mate. But this whatever-it-is thing... I'm sure you'll make a really good one." Ron nodded, obviously still not even having the first clue as to what Harry was talking about. The boy smiled weakly, nodding once.

"Thanks, guys."

So many emotions had been poured into those two words that they fell silent, taking up a seat at the end of the Gryffindor table where no one else was seated. Anyone from their house who was there that early was either shooting their small group pointed glances or forcibly ignoring them. Even the most insignificant first year could tell something had happened. The Hufflepuff students were known for their loyalty, so when they saw old friends turned on one-another they recognized it easily. The Ravenclaw easily reasoned out that Harry was the center of the disturbance at the end of the table- they weren't _blind_. And the Slitherin were the masters of intrigue and deception- their political lessons from their families had taught them much about determining what was being said when no words were spoken.

So when the one person who might have had _any_ chance of making Harry's life worse than it was approached them, they shouldn't have been so surprised. Unfortunately... they were caught rather unprepared for an attack of the Potions Master kind.

"Mr. Potter." the sneer in the voice identified the speaker without any of them having to turn around. All three of them stiffened, but Harry's gentle tug on their sleeves stopped them from doing anything rash. He stood up to face the man, something that he had apparently not been expecting as the professor hesitated a moment. That was all Harry needed- a moment.

"Yes, Professor?" he asked, smoothly. His two friends winced. That wasn't a tone of voice he had ever used with them. It was far too cold for the boy that they knew to be the one behind it... "Did you want something?"

Black eyes met ones the color of the spell that stole lives away from its victims... and the teacher internally baulked at the fact that the way the school had been treating the boy seemed to have detached him from what had previously made him fear Snape. Before, he would have dreaded house points being taken away and detentions being served. Before, being banned from the sport he loved so much would have broken him. ...but from what he had heard from a loud fool in the halls, the boy hadn't even showed up to practice the last few times, and he didn't seem to mind if his house was punished on his account. Any attempt at giving him detention would have simply been accepted gracefully, for it was an hour or two he would be able to escape the student body. Not for the first time, Severus found himself being stared down by someone younger, weaker, and definitely less intelligent... and he _hated_ it because he no longer held any power over the boy's head.

Teeth gritted tightly, he held back his temper and spoke up. He would _not_ be reduced to the weaker one in this equation. The hell if he would be beaten by some stuck up brat that had always gotten what he wanted... even if he _did_ have a potentially dangerous talent that the Slitherin head of house had never even considered before that could possibly spell his sudden death if he angered the younger boy... _bloody hell_ he hated this situation.

"The headmaster wants to speak with you." he got out, turning quickly and walking away. Damn it, damn it, DAMN IT! Reduced not only to a messenger boy, but to also have any amount of power he held over the arrogant boy stripped from him as well...? This just wasn't his day...

"Wonder what's got _his_ knickers in a twist?" Ron mused as they watched the fuming man's retreat. Harry shrugged, honestly having no idea.

"Maybe one of his potions blew up. You guys go ahead and finish eating- I'll go see what Dumbledore wants."

Despite their protests, he left them fairly easily. He felt almost sad that his logical side protested bringing them along... they really had no idea how much it meant to him that they stuck by his side. They had even forsaken the rest of their house to support him... he wished there was some way to express his gratitude towards them, but there really were no words to say and no gifts to give that could get across the full point. For now, all he could do was work his hardest to make sure they were safe... well, and maybe stop scaring them with his half-lost delusions of death. When they were there to support him, he had to keep hanging on... if only by his fingernails.

He walked up the halls to the Headmaster's office, finding it only slightly disturbing that he knew the password when he reached the gargoyle hiding the moving staircase behind it. Just a piece of his Slitherin showing through when he had committed the phrase to memory...

"Sherbet Lemon." he said quietly, and the statue jumped aside. Riding the stairs up, Harry's mind went over everything that he might be in trouble for. ...Dumbledore wasn't one to call him on being a Parselmouth... he wouldn't have been mad for Harry escaping his common room the night before- McGonigall had all but offered a new place for him to sleep, after all... and in the end, the Headmaster seemed to like watching the lives of his students run their courses. So why was he being summoned?

The man was sitting behind his desk when Harry entered the room, smiling gently behind his glasses. To Harry's surprise, McGonigall was standing nearby, looking only a little bit guilty.

"Hello, my dear boy- sit down, sit down. Lemon drop?" he offered the small candy, and Harry politely refused. He had never had one of the candies and he never really intended to.

"No thank you, sir."

"Very well then, Harry. Minerva has brought an issue to my attention that I would like to discuss with you. Apparently you brought a question to her attention last night that raised some interest in you taking on an individual project outside of classes?" Harry's eyes frosted over and he glanced over at the woman, annoyed that the woman who had promised her silence had spoken on their topic so... _easily_. For a moment, Albus was privy to a scene that he had only experienced a few times before in his long life- the roles had been reversed, and he was looking at an child silently reprimanding an embarrassed adult like the student had taken the place of the teacher...

"...yes, there was some talk of something like that." he admitted, turning back to the Headmaster with a quiet response, and the old man was forced to jump-start his mind back into reality. That had been certainly an interesting moment... "It seemed like it might be... rather fun to try and make a wand out of a different shape and substance..."

"Would you like to share your theory with me as to what might be most 'fun' to make?" Dumbledore's eyes were shining with pride. Harry ducked his head, feeling a strange warmth rise in his veins. He wanted to surprise them. That pride... he _liked_ that. He wanted to see it in the Headmaster's eyes another time when he brought back his project, completed and totally functional.

"If you don't mind sir, I'd sort of like to surprise you." the man nodded once, and Harry allowed himself to breathe easy.

"Well, you can get started today if you like. I hear Minerva's offered you one of her laboratories, but I wasn't wondering if you might like a room completely of your own to work in...?"

He felt his heart leap. He knew where he wanted.

"Room 308?" he asked, almost without realizing he was saying it. When they both blinked at his quick reaction, he scratched the back of his neck with a weak laugh. "...er... sorry. I've grown to like it there... it's been a sort of... sanctuary, I suppose. If it's too much trouble, I could just..."

"No, 308 should be fine." Dumbledore nodded once, regaining his footing easily. Even _he_ hadn't known that the young Potter had taken a liking to the room... "Would you like to accompany Minerva there so you might be allowed to reorganize it to your liking?"

"Yes. I would like that very much." the look that the boy shot the older woman promised that she was _not_ getting away with breaking her promise so easily as with a simple glare. Skimming over it, Dumbledore gave the boy a pleasant smile.

"Very well then, Harry. If you'd like to bring a list of ingredients you desire to my attention, I would be glad to work out details with you. For now, you probably have things much more intriguing to do than spend your Sunday afternoon in a room with an old man. So if you would like to-"

"Please wait a moment, sir." he paused, wondering how to say this. "...er ...if you don't mind me asking, sir... why are you letting me have my own lab? I mean, surely it would be less trouble to just set me up with a little place where I won't be disturbed...? Why do I get a whole room to myself? Why is this little wandless wand thing so important?"

There was a small pause. ...and to Harry's surprise, when Dumbledore looked back up at him, those shining eyes that always seemed to fantastically blue looked... old. They looked sad.

"...why my dear boy, this research might be revolutionary to the wizarding world." he said, carefully choosing his words. "In fact, I fully expect that this project of yours might be so 'fun' indeed that you may find yourself losing track of the time. Minerva, please do remember to place a bed in the room somewhere in case young Harry falls asleep while he works or finds himself out of his common room after curfew. We don't want him getting in trouble with Argus for simply being inspired, do we?"

"No, Headmaster." McGonigall shook her head, looking away. She knew exactly what he was doing. She was the reason _why_ he was doing it...

"...Sir..." Harry's mouth was slightly open. Was Dumbledore... really doing what he thought he was doing? Was he _really_ telling Harry that he had permission to stay in room 308... to sleep there, and never have to go back to the Gryffindor common room again...? What was he supposed to _say_ to that? ...no, he knew what to say. What else _could_ he say, after all? After a moment, he managed to still his emotions and look up at both of them. _Now_ he got why his transfiguration teacher had told Dumbledore. She had wanted this for him... an unspoken apology for 'her' house being so horrible towards him. ...McGonigall had broken a promise... and made his life _better_ for it. "...thank you."

The aging Headmaster just nodded once, his usually-cheerful eyes filled with a painful remorse that Harry felt like a punch to the gut. He _really_ cared... and was trying to help Harry, even though he was a Parselmouth. Both of them were trying to _help_.

"Come along, Potter." his teacher said quickly, walking past him to get to the door. A quiet student followed after her, back down the stairs with McGonigall at his back.

They walked in silence for a moment, the professor fidgeting nervously. It would come any time- she knew that. She had broken a promise to a boy who needed trust more than anything else at that moment. During their meeting the day before, the boy had honestly believed in her. ...he might never do that again...

"...Professor?" the boy spoke up. McGonigall almost flinched, expecting a thorough scolding by the eerie green eyes of a boy not even _half_ her age. "...I just want to say... you know... _thanks_. For putting the Headmaster up to this."

"...I quite honestly don't know what you mean, Mr. Potter." she replied smoothly. He wasn't mad. Thank Merlin... she had been quite pleased at the idea of being an authority figure that the boy could actually _talk_ to... so many other students had favorite teachers that they trusted- but Potter had never displayed any sort of inclination in that way before coming to talk to her..."It's only right that an aspiring student might be allowed a solitary place to work. Many other children before you have been permitted a slice of Hogwarts- Merlin only knows how few of the rooms are in use..."

The boy fell into silence, realizing that if the teachers never _referred_ to it as his new quarters, no one would ever be able to lay blame on them for anything more than allowing one of their students the leniency to learn and grow at his own rate, whatever rate that might be. He nodded once, dull eyes for once seeming to have an ounce or two of life in them.

"...I understand." he whispered, nodding once. It would be nothing more than a lab, then. ...a lab with a bed where he could stay and no one else would be able to get in, sure- but still a lab. A sudden thought came to him, and he hummed slightly to get his teacher's attention. "...is it... uh... is it alright if I bring someone else to room 308 sometimes?" when she turned to him with an eyebrow raised he averted his eyes, biting his lip. "...well, you know... I was just thinking that _maybe_ someone might want a place to do their homework, and since the whole room's going to be empty besides a couple of tables and a bed..."

"I see no reason why they wouldn't be able to visit." she shrugged, knowing full well what he meant. She wasn't _stupid_. It was obvious that Harry would bring his friends there whether he got permission or not.

A nod in thanks that was swiftly forgotten as they came to the door of the disused classroom. Even as they stepped inside, McGonigall had to wonder- why _here?_ The Headmaster would have given the boy any room he liked, but what made this one so special that Harry would think of it as soon as the offer was made? What made this single room so _important_ to him that he would refuse somewhere nicer, more habitable, and less- _she shuddered at the thought_- close to the freezing dungeons where Snape's domain resided? What on _earth_ caused the boy to choose _this_ place?

It was a mystery. Maybe she could figure it out later.

"Alright, Potter." She set her mind back to the task at hand, pulling out her wand and spelling away the dust and desks. Without them there, it made the room look... big. Lonely. Uncomfortably empty and unfathomably unwelcoming. Swallowing her initial reaction- which was, of coarse, to ask him if he wouldn't like a room somewhere in one of the towers- she held up the wand, eyebrow raised in silent question.

"Just a table and a bed please, Professor." he insisted, and she sighed. With a wave of her wand and a little of the mortar between the bricks as the base material, she transfigured the requested objects and floated them over to the side wall. When she turned back to inquire if that was it, she found him looking interestedly at the furniture.

"...how does that work?" he asked, eyes gleaming in interest. "Just making things out of nothing, I mean. I thought you could only make solid objects out of other objects with the same amount of base material?"

...and once more, the beast named Hidden Intelligence reared its head in the mind of one Harry Potter, stunning McGonigall with how much more the boy understood than he was actually letting on.

"...that's true." she mused, pondering the instance herself. "But only in the laws of Transfiguration. Two branches of magic can be mixed to create much out of little." when his eyes rose to meet her own with unabashed interest, she continued on, pleased that she had found a student that really wanted to learn for _learning's_ sake. There were some students that didn't want to learn but did so merely out of caring for their grades, and some that expressed an interest in learning, but cared so much for their grades that it stifled them. Hermione Granger was, she was sad to say, one of the second sort. She was a brilliant girl for sure, but she wanted to know _fact_ and _books_ and _logic_. There was no imagination mixed in with a mind like that- no part of the girl would ever have thought to approach a teacher with a question based on a theory that revolved around art, something that required creativity.

Potter may not have showed much in terms of spectacular grades before, but she could honestly see that he wasn't the dunce she had originally thought him to be when he entered her class on the first day, not knowing the difference between a Gobstone and a Hinkypunk.

"Here." she murmured, creating another object in the same way as the other two. It was a blackboard with some chalk. She led the boy towards it, picking up a piece of the chalk and drawing out a picture for him. "You would have learned this had you ever entered into a class of Advanced Magical Method... but such a thing is, I'm afraid, not taught in Hogwarts. To be brief, entirely different branches of magic can be mixed together in a single spell... if you know what you're doing. Just then, I cast a spell that took the material from the floor and mixed an equation of enlargement with transfiguration at the same moment." she wrote it out, wondering vaguely if the boy would understand a word she was saying. He was a _second_ year, after all.

And to her stunned and disbelieving amusement, the boy pointed directly at the equation on the board, a question already on his mind.

"That's what's behind an enlargement spell?" he asked. When she nodded, impressed that he had immediately figured out which part of the equation was the enlargement spell and which part was the transfiguration, he raised an eyebrow at the complex symbols. She knew it was too hard for him. She had purposefully given him something far beyond his level in an attempt to see just how far he could work with it. After a moment, Harry frowned, standing back to look at it. "...it's like math, right...?" he mumbled to himself, and Minerva blinked when he shrugged uncomfortably to her. "...I'm sorry, I just... don't get these symbols. I never learned this sort of math."

She nodded, vanishing the equation on the board with a lazy wave of her wand.

"It's alright, Potter. Many wizards and witches never learn this in their whole lives. Most of them are willing to simply believe that since the spells work, they need no adjustment- and as such, they never bother to seek out what such symbols mean. Does it interest you?" she added on, almost as a curious afterthought. To her surprise, he nodded.

"...I guess... yeah. There's logic behind this chaos of magic, and I sort of want to know what it is."

"...very well then, Potter." a sheet of paper appeared in her hand and she scrawled a short note on it with the tip of her wand. As she handed it to him, her eyebrows crawled into her hairline and her lips thinned, giving him a _very_ imperious look. He had better appreciate this... "There should be a book or two on Advanced Magical Method in the restricted section of the library. This permission note will last for as long as you don't try anything stupid. Do not even _think_ of examining any of the other books there or your privileges will be denied at once." when he looked up at her with wide, stunned eyes, she just turned away and headed for the door.

When she had escaped detection by those shimmering green eyes, she allowed herself a little smile of satisfaction. What she had neglected to mention was that Advanced Magical Method was one of the most complex and utterly difficult arts in existence. From what she had seen so far, the boy wanted to _learn,_ not prove himself to them- likely why his grades suffered while he seemed as though he could perform magic just fine. If the boy could learn it from a few school-level books and no other guidance... well, she might just have to look into getting him placed in some of the advanced classes...

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Yawn-sigh-fall over-flop-snooze

...uh... yeah. Happy Ishtar/Easter. I feel like a raving dork for saying this, but my dad got me a little fuzzy rabbit doll as a present. I think I'm gunna name it 'Mortimer'.

...so... yeah... see ya. (Mortimer waves goodbye)


	4. Chapter 4

Okay, so apparently there are a few things that need to get sorted out.

First order of business: Slash is nice. Yaoi is fun. Homosexuality is just as happy as anything else. ...that said, you realize this ISN'T Yaoi, right? Nev, Ron, and Harry are friends, just like Seth and Harry are friends and Hermione and Harry are friends. ...point is, they're _not_ screwing one another at every possible interval. Hell, I don't even know if this story's going to _have_ pairing yet. So just... _relax_ on the slash thing, okay?

Second order of business: (and I do believe I'm allowed to swear at this point) ..._the fuck?_ Harry, if you 'Independent Harry' lovers haven't noticed, is _twelve_. He's an emotionally broken, barely functional member of society with a desire to commit suicide. He doesn't have the slightest clue how to be self-supportive right now! Sure, I intend for him to grow into a person others can rely on and respect, but _not yet_, comprende? Right now, he's barely being kept in one piece with Nev's and Ron's and Seth's support. So _get used to it_.

Third order of business: Tea is pleasantly delicious.

Fourth order of business: Harry is strong for his age, yes. He's smart for his age, sure. But he will _not_... I repeat, _not_ turn into Super-Harry. He's not going to become God overnight, and any one of the teachers could easily kick his scrawny little ass at this point, let alone Voldie and Dumbles. He will gradually gain powers as he creates more and more little amusing trinkets for himself to play with, but even though Parselmouth is meant to open up the 'locks' that he put on himself at a young age, that doesn't mean the cliche 'oh, Dumbledore put wards on my true power and I'm superman and suddenly dark for no apparent reason blah blah blah' thing. He's smarter than he gives himself credit for and he can understand concepts that make other people's brains hurt. ...beyond that, he's (as I've said before) _Twelve_. What were _you_ doing when you were twelve? Were you a super-powered snake-speaking wizard in training destined to kick major ass without ever having a reason to? No? Then we're on the same page. Oh goody.

Fifth order of business: Tea is still pleasantly delicious. I like tea. Mortimer the Rabbit likes tea too. ...but not powdered milk. Powdered milk is sort of nasty... but (sigh) it's all we have in the house right now...

I don't own Harry Potter. I _do_ own a stuffed rabbit named Mortimer that makes random appearances in the authors notes. Thank you for your time.

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Half a week later, Dumbledore was reading over what may have been the most perplexing and amusing grocery list of all time.

It had come to him along with his dinner- a hasty note written on a small piece of parchment with what seemed to be a Muggle pen. Sitting up in his office now, he pondered over the question of how on _earth_ Harry Potter intended half his required ingredients to go together in a 'wand that wasn't a wand'. It was such an utter conundrum unto itself that he hadn't even tried to read the boy's thoughts to discern what the final product would be- it seemed so much more interesting to see what he came up with on his own.

Still... what on earth did the boy intend to do with an absurdly large chunk of clear quartz, a handful of rather uncommon potions ingredients that the Headmaster could have been _sure_ the boy hadn't known about before, and enough obsidian to pave a small sidewalk? Merlin's beard- what was the boy trying to _make?_

If there was one thing the Headmaster had learned in his extraordinarily long lifetime, it was that when a child expressed an interest in something that others might say was beyond their league, it was better to allow them to do as they pleased. No matter how experienced an adult was and how much they thought they knew, even in situations where they literally could read the student's mind, they would never be able to truly grasp _exactly_ what their younger counterparts could be capable of. Only the children themselves knew that.

So as he signed off the list with a distinctly apprehensive curiosity. In the beginning, it had all been about getting poor Harry out of the crushing grasp of the cruel grasp of the unforgiving school children and into a place where he wouldn't become paranoid about remaining in his own house. Dumbledore wasn't _insane_, no matter who wanted to argue otherwise- he too had been raised with the inherent fear and loathing of Parselmouthes that other Purebloods had always been taught. Harry was lucky enough that Dumbledore had forsaken that prejudice long ago, when he'd had his _first_ Parselmouth student. Back then... he had treated Tom Riddle _wrongly_- he knew it. He had denied the boy time after time to be allowed to stay at Hogwarts over the summer because... and he loathed to admit it... he had been more than a little scared of the boy. Fear of Parselmouthes wasn't something easy. It was _ingrained_ in their society. Everyone from the highest lord to the most insignificant half-blood had been raised with at least a _little_ fear of them, and the Headmaster was _quite_ sure that by now, every Muggle-born in the school had been indoctrinated into at least a _little_ of that same fear.

Some people might have drawn away from Harry because of his gift. Not Dumbledore. Harry was a student just like any other, and forked tongue or not, he would never be denied any part of the school simply for his talents.

Halfway across the school, the subject of his musings probably would have been a lot better off for hearing those words.

Harry was holed up in room 308 again, eyes fixed on the same passage in his copy of the Advanced Magical Method text that he had been staring at twenty minutes ago without really seeing it. The same scene replayed through his head _again_ and _again_ as he desperately struggled to forget what had just happened _and_ to burn it into his memory for all eternity at the same time.

_I hate you_, she'd said.

...he... honestly hadn't expected it. He'd known they'd hated him. He hadn't known how _much_.

It had been a fourth year Ravenclaw... a friend of Justin. And she had told him in no uncertain terms that nothing could have pleased her more than to hear he had jumped off the top of the north tower and reduced his existence to a smear on the ground.

It shouldn't have hurt him as badly as it had. ...and yet, something about those words nearly blew him away with their callous ferocity. They mirrored his own thoughts so perfectly that it had shocked him to hear them coming from someone else's mouth for a moment- like some power had siphoned off the depression of his thoughts and transmitted them to her lips.

_He wanted to._

Merlin, he wanted to do it. Just... jump and end himself right there. ...but...

He knew he had things to do.

Maybe it was why he was taking on so many things at once, he realized belatedly. He was putting more and more on his plate so that he knew he wouldn't _really_ be able to off himself- at the beginning of the week... maybe he might have done it. But now he had Seth and Neville looking out for him, a whole new branch of magic to immerse himself in, a rather amusing project planned out, Parseltongue to practice, _and_ his original mystery to solve. So many things to do and _no way_ to actually _do_ any of them if he allowed himself to die.

It dawned on him that it was likely he would be doing a _lot_ of things until he cleared his name. If he slowed up and finished one goal without starting another one first... well, he might as well have just never done anything in the first place.

And speaking of doing things...

He fell onto his back, allowing his book to fall to his chest and pulling off his glasses so he could rub the bridge of his nose. Replacing the glasses, he glanced to the side with an eyebrow raised, amused at himself without really meaning to be. It was more like he was amused at the Parselmouth in him. ...or maybe just the absolutely baffling part of him that actually _understood_ what he had written out on the blackboard that his transfiguration teacher had left for him.

The young boy in him that liked flying and talking to his friends and playing exploding snap couldn't understand a word of the damn equation-sketch that took up most of the board. But the snake in him had taken to this whole plan like a fish to water... almost alarmingly well.

The book had helped. ...a lot. It took a while to get it, but when he actually figured out what the hell half the passages were going on about, it was surprising how much sense it made. ...more sense than just waving your wand around, saying some words that didn't make sense, and hoping something happened, at least.

He smiled up at the board once more, truly pleased with his work. He had been developing a theory that he intended to test out very soon- one of the simplest spell-equations to work with seemed to be Wingardium Leviosa, so he had decided to play with that one for a little while. In short, he had added in a little extra and taken out what seemed unnecessary so that now, instead of just floating things, the spell should be able to be used on oneself so that they could float their body if they were falling. It was one of the main problems with the original spell- you needed a steady anchor point to perform it, so the most useful application it could possibly be used in was one that simply didn't work.

Well... that would be fixed soon enough.

He shifted the book away, laying sprawled on the bed. ...he had been there ever since Justin's friend had yelled at him.

He could almost imagine it... the scene that would occur between them. It would be at the end of the year... he would have cleared his name and he'd be leaning against the door frame of the big oak doors down on the first floor. He'd be... laughing at a joke Ron had just made- that's right. And Neville would be laughing along with him, Hermione smiling even though she was so worried about having missed so many classes. Justin would walk up to him with his friend and they would apologize like they expected Harry to just forgive them at the drop of a hat.

It was as clear as though he was watching the scene on television. Especially the part directly after that when he told that damned Ravenclaw that he hated her and nothing would please him more than her jumping off the top of north tower. See how _she _liked it. And Justin... he would have been just as bad as the rest of them had he not been attacked. But... he still hadn't really _done_ anything to Harry. Maybe... no. It would be up to _them_ to prove themselves something other than frustrating gits in his eyes...

Shaking his head to clear it, Harry rolled off the bed and haphazardly wandered over to his work station, leaving his book where it was. If he needed it, he would come back to get it later.

Maybe it was the Parselmouth in him. Maybe it was the child raised in a cupboard that had grown up forced to entertain himself with his own brain. Whatever it was... once he had found out some information on the proper construction of wands, he was surprised no one else had ever done this before. It seemed so easy...

"_Master Harry? Are you alright?_"

The raven-haired boy smiled weakly down at Seth. Not really a pet- no, more of a friend. A good friend who would do just about anything for Harry, up to and including playing an overprotective brother at times...

"_...I am... fine. Some of the students are being... unreasonable._"

"_Tell me who and they shall succumb to my bite before they have another chance to be 'unreasonable' towards my Master._" the snake demanded, rising up and flaring out his hood threateningly. Harry smiled slightly, kneeling down to pick up the cobra.

"_That's very kind of you, Seth. But I get the feeling that if anyone else in the school gets attacked, I'm likely to get mobbed and killed the next time I leave this little den here._" he vaguely waved his hand around, gesturing to the room they had to themselves. If he didn't know better, he could have sworn that the Cobra was _pouting_ as he relaxed, decorative hood smoothing back down along his neck.

"_...you... shouldn't let them do this to you, Master Harry._" the snake hissed gently, wrapping itself around his neck. "_You may not want them to hurt you for something you have not done, but that doesn't mean they are allowed to hurt __you__ for no reason, either. Please consider defending yourself the next time they are 'unreasonable' to you._"

"_How on earth did I ever manage before you came along, Seth?_" Harry gave an honest chuckle at the memory of how bad his mental and emotional state had been before he had first summoned the snake. Speaking of which... "_...uh... Seth? Not to be rude or anything, but... well, you know- you're not a real snake, are you?_"

"_Yes, Master Harry._" he agreed, bobbing his head once. "_I'm a snake for all intents and purposes, but you made me with your own magic and soul. You needed me, and I was made to be what you needed most. I owe you my loyalties twice over for that- you are my Creator and Master in the same right. So that's right- I am not a 'real snake'. ...does that... displease you?_" Harry could even hear the slightly nervous waver in Seth's voice, almost as though the cobra feared that Harry would turn on him once he knew the snake wasn't technically 'real'.

In response, Harry raised a hand and rested it on the serpent's head, lending the cold-blooded creature his warmth. ...he had _made_ Seth? Not... summoned him from somewhere else? Then that meant he was... sort of like the cobra's _father_, in a way... and Harry knew how much he would have dreaded disappointing his own father, had James still been alive...

"_Seth._" he whispered quietly, the cold barrier he had tried to keep his voice restricted to ever since the beginning of the rest of the school's torment of him. "_I asked because I wanted to know if you were going to have to go back to wherever you came from if I had simply summoned you. I wanted to know if... we were going to have to be separated once the spell wore off. You're the best friend I could have ever hoped for, Seth- and now that I know you're here for good, I can relax a bit. Don't you ever consider yourself below other snakes- I know I never will. Understand?_"

There was a moment of silence in which the two of them stared at one-another, Seth's beady eyes meeting Harry's own vibrant green. ...then, the snake bowed its head once, curling up closer to Harry's neck.

"_...Master Harry... thank you._"

"_It isn't something that requires thanks._" he shrugged, setting about back to his worktable in an attempt to rid his mind of the image of Seth being his 'child'... his imagination was getting _far_ too overactive of late...

There wasn't much on the table as of yet- and indeed, there wouldn't be until the headmaster gave the thumbs up to what he was asking for- but there _was_ something that he was already working on. Delicately picking up the vial he wrinkled his nose at what was inside, but he knew it was necessary. Disgusting, sure- but for what he intended to happen...

A few drops of a well-known magical infuser later and the vial was secured back on the table, Harry trying his best to ignore it. Blood magic was known for being one of the darkest arts, but he had found a peculiar loophole during his studies that allowed him the leniency he needed for the moment. It was a rare law that he had only come across a day and a half before that stated blood magic could be used in circumstances where a wizard desired to 'fine tune' his wand to his specific magical frequency. Harry wasn't about to go off _telling_ anyone that he was using his own blood as a magical core, sure, but if anyone ever _did_ find out, then he wasn't likely to get arrested for it. It would have a beautiful upside, too- if anyone else ever tried to use his creation, the simplest spell would apparently backfire with the most _incredible_ results.

'Fun' indeed...

Stretching out his back, he set down Seth onto his bed and covered up the serpent, knowing both that the snake needed warmth and that he couldn't exactly carry his creation around wherever he went. Not if he wanted to stay out of prison, at least...

It was dinnertime for the rest of the school, so Harry figured he would be able to get a few moments to himself if he wanted to drop in at the library. Madame Pince had slowly become more and more used to his unusual visits, and she had stopped watching his every move in _her_ book aisles and opted to simply ignore him. He didn't know if this was good or bad but took it as a positive sign, and this time he even spoke with her for a moment.

"Excuse me?" he murmured, the first interaction he had taken with her since he had taken a moment to hand her his permission slip to get into the restricted section. The librarian blinked once before her eyes narrowed, nodding once.

"Yes, Mr. Potter? What is it this time?"

"I'm... sorry for disturbing you." he held up his hands defensively, showing her he wasn't about to curse her into oblivion or anything. "I just thought maybe... I was wondering if perhaps you knew where I could find a guide on the magical properties of metal." it had been dancing around the back of his mind ever since he first read a little about different metals in the Advanced Magical Method book. It had seemed to conduct magic much like it did electricity, so he was wondering if he could figure out the reason Muggle technology shorted out around magic. The librarian considered him for a moment before sniffing, nodding once, and leading the way out from behind the counter. She silently led him to a bookshelf in the back, standing on tip toe to snatch two books, shoving them into his arms- Masterpiece Magical Metallurgy volumes One and Two- but before he could thank her and ask to check them out before any of the other students returned, she grabbed his shoulder.

There was a frozen moment in which Harry tensed, wondering if asking the librarian in the first place had been such a good idea, but after a moment of considering his eyes she spoke up.

"...you've been here a good deal more often than ever before, Mr. Potter." she mentioned, getting straight to the point. "And I'd like to thank you for trying to keep your visits to times when other children aren't wandering the halls. Minerva has allowed you practically free access to the restricted section, Merlin help her, and I would hate to think of what others might say if they learned about that. That said, will you please consider finishing a few of the books you've already checked out before taking any more?"

"...I'm... sorry, ma'am." Harry winced, realizing what she was talking about. She was concerned for him... in an offhand way. More about her books and the reputation of her library, sure- but it was advice meant to keep him out of trouble, and he appreciated that. "I just need one page from A Defensive Field Guide to Magical Monsters, so I can copy it down and return it as soon as you want me to, and I should be done with Advanced Magical Method in about another week. I'm sorry- I just wasn't thinking straight... would you like it if I left these here until the Defensive Field Guide comes back?"

"...no." she decided, shaking her head. "Check these out and take your time with the Magical Method book, but a few students have requested the Field Guide. Perhaps because it's one of the few books in our library to have a complete description of Parselmouthes...?" the question was left hanging, and Harry gulped slightly. One glance up at her revealed that she hadn't meant it in a scathing way, but he hadn't thought before that he would ever be _glad_ at how little information the book revealed.

"...fairly horrible description, if you ask me." he shrugged, allowing her to confirm her suspicions that he had been using the book to look up what little he could find on what he was. She hummed neutrally in an offhand manner, guiding him back to the entrance and writing down the titles of the two books on a clipboard list of who had checked out what. Before he could leave, she spoke to him one final time.

"Be careful, Mr. Potter. Rumors run wild over how to kill a Parselmouth, and I doubt you're any less susceptible to a shard of jade in your gut than any other student. That will be all."

"...thank... you?" he mused, wondering over what she meant as he dragged the heavy books out the door. Jade shard in the gut? What the bloody hell was _that _supposed to mean?

He found out what she had been talking about the very next day. Coming down to the great hall to try and find Ron and Neville for the first time in almost 24 hours, he kept snatching glances of the students around him nervously fiddling with long green spikes, usually tied around their neck as the jewel of a necklace. When he managed to slink over to their seat at the end of the table with his two friends, he whispered a question to them.

"Morning, guys. Do I want to know why everyone's taken to wearing Slytherin house colors...?"

"No." Ron replied at once, hand visibly bandaged and teeth clenched. "No, you really don't."

"Ron broke Dean's piece this morning." Neville explained quietly, glancing over at the redhead with a look halfway between apprehension and gratefulness. "Cut his hand up doing it, too, but Dean was talking about how he was going to use it on you the next time he saw you..."

"...use the... what?" Harry blinked, still confused. Ron huffed, looking away.

"Some ruddy git managed to convince half the bloody school that jade is to Parselmouthes like garlic is to vampires or something bloody useless like that. A load of barmy tosh if you ask me, but Dean wanted to cut you up with his piece to see if it really worked."

"...oh..." Harry trailed off, glancing down at Ron's hand. He had hurt himself... protecting Harry? Allowing himself to indulge in a brief moment of sentimentality, the raven-haired boy pulled out his wand and tapped the injured hand once, whispering one of the few healing spells he had come across in his Advanced Magical Method book. At the look of shock on his readheaded friend's face, he assumed it had worked. Sparing a glance into the other boy's blue eyes, he smiled weakly. "...Ron... thank you."

"...aw, mate..." Ron unwrapped the now-unnecessary bandage, biting his lip. "...it's nothing... just had to teach that prat a lesson, see? Didn't want him thinking he could just get away with trying something like that..."

"All the same, thank you." Harry nodded, heart soaring both at the fact that the spell had worked _and_ that Ron had deemed it worth bodily injury to stick up for him. The redhead waved it off with a piece of toast, quickly changing the subject.

"So how's that project of yours going, mate? You keep vanishing off away, so we figured you've got a lot of work done."

"...not really." he shrugged. "The core's almost done, but I just handed in what I need last night, and it hasn't even been given the okay yet..."

"Well, good luck anyways." Neville raised his goblet in a toast to the _whatever the hell it was_ that Harry was making. The Boy Who Lived grinned back at him, raising his own goblet.

"Thanks. I'll need all I can get, with how frustrating half the thing seems. In the meantime, I'm thinking about making something else that you guys might both like... it's actually a lot easier to make than the first project, but I'm still stuck on the 'trying to figure out how to enchant it' stage. So... just realize that you might be getting some bloody _weird_ Christmas gifts next year, alright?"

"I'm not sure if I should feel scared or grateful..." Ron teased, amused. Neville nodded in agreement, and it looked as though he was about to reply as well, but then...

"Potter and the Weasel have a new pet, I see."

Without hardly thinking about it, Harry and Ron flipped Malfoy the bird at the same time, Neville grumbling the words "Oh, sod off..." The blond drew back to his full height, eyes roaming over their little group. Finally, after a moment he drew the corner of his lips back into a sneer worthy of Snape, obviously darkly amused about something.

"Why Potter, it's good to see you've ditched the Mudblood at last and taken up a Pureblood on either arm. Sure, one's a blood traitor and the other may as well be a squib, but you're on the right track at least..." Neville's face flushed scarlet and Ron made as though he was about to stand up, but Harry grabbed the hem of his cloak and pulled him back down. The Slytherin prince smirked. "Never would have thought _you_ were the heir, Potter. Too Slytherin for Slytherin itself, eh? Fooled even the hat in the end. Nice to know you've got the right idea of how to treat the Mudblood scum, even if the rest of this lot don't see it." he gestured around with one well-manicured hand, conveying that he meant the rest of the school. "...but we snakes- we get it. Come on, Potter. Sit by us today. You don't have to surround yourself by this _filth_." he held out the same hand, almost like he was asking Harry to shake.

The raven-haired boy's eyes skimmed the assembled school, noting interestedly that only the Slytherins themselves _weren't_ wearing a piece of green stone. Eyes sliding back to Malfoy, he stared at the hand for a moment.

Then, he reached out and clasped it in his own fist, standing up.

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Dun-dun-dun! ...yep. I'm gunna leave you with that for a while.

...Jade. Uh... yeah. It was going to be onyx, but then I remembered how jade was all... shiny. And... green. I like green. But I like shiny more.

...yeah. It's probably hard to imagine someone who writes something this angsty and dark is actually this... random. (Mortimer shakes his head) Oh shush, you fluffy ball of fabric stitched into a pattern with cotton inside. The hell are you still here for? (Mortimer looks sad) ...sorry, bunny. I still love you! (Mortimer's ears perk up and he hops over) Yay! Bunny's still made of cotton and fuzzy cloth, but why the hell am I complaining? Until next time!


	5. Chapter 5

Aah... damn. You guys must really hate me right now.

This is a really short chapter, but I figured I had to give you guys a conclusion to that cliffie last time before you all go nuts. And sorry for not updating in so long- that has an explanation too, but it's at the end of the chapter, so read on.

Mortimer says we don't own Harry Potter. I'm inclined to agree with him.

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Harry grabbed the hand and pulled Draco off balance, causing the blond boy to stumble forward. The Boy Who Lived caught him, one fist clamped on the Slytherin boy's shoulder so as to make sure he couldn't draw away. Leaning forward, the raven-haired boy whispered into his captive's ear, a dangerous glint in his eyes.

"Be grateful you lot's little stint with leaving off with the bloody green rocks has got me in a good mood or you'd be leaving the hall with a few broken bones for suggesting I ditch Ron and Neville like that_ Malfoy_." he hissed out, teeth gritted. "If you want to bloody well piss me off, you're doing a wonderful job of it. Go be a good little pansy and suck up to someone else's shoes- I speak with _snakes_, not _worms_. Now if you'd like to remove yourself from my line of sight and try to grow a pair, I think I'll stick with my _friends_, not some weak little ass-kisser trying to sneak in favor with the rest of his house." there was a moment of shocked silence where everyone who had been brave enough to sit near Harry stared at the two of them in shock, before the raven-haired boy's lips pulled back into a sneer. The grip he held on Draco's shoulder clamped down painfully hard for a moment, and he mentioned almost casually- "...and just so you know... if you _ever_ call Hermione that word again, I _will_ make sure that every single serpent on the castle grounds knows that you think your morning cup of pumpkin juice tastes better with snake piss in it. I'm sure they'd be glad to oblige."

He practically tossed the boy away, watching with narrowed eyes as the blond awkwardly stumbled back to his housemates, all of whom crowded around him to try and get the scoop since they had been too far away to hear what had just taken place. Harry came back and sat down beside Ron and Neville, both of whom were grinning.

"...mate..." Ron clapped him on the shoulder. "...that was the most bloody awesome thing to happen all _year_."

"Considering it's _this_ year, that's not saying much..." Harry grumbled, looking around with a paranoid eye. Knowing that practically everyone around him had a sharp piece of green rock that they wanted to stab him with wasn't really helping him relax, and after his little stunt with Malfoy, he had a bad feeling that the rumors were going to get twisted around to where he wished he really _had_ allied himself with the Slytherin git. Not that it was very likely that the stupid bunch of rocks really _did_ have any effect on him, but rocks were still rocks, and if someone decided to stab him with one to see if it worked, it wouldn't hurt any less than any other sharp object driven into his flesh. Harry stood once more, feeling a sinking in his stomach that had absolutely nothing to do with the food he _should_ have been eating at that point. The eyes that followed his every movement as he stood up were making him feel a bit too... twitchy. "I'm just going to go. _Away_." he stated, gesturing vaguely over his shoulder in some undetermined direction. He didn't want to be near these people right now. Hell, he _never_ wanted to be around them, but it was just so much worse today...

"You want us to come with you?" Neville asked quietly, a look of understanding concern on his face. Harry shook his head.

"No- you just... just keep eating and don't worry about me. If I'm a few minutes late for class, don't be surprised. I'll be fine." He waved them off, stumbling back out of the great hall. His stomach growled uncomfortably, but he put it out of his mind- he had spent the summers with very little food, he would survive a day without breakfast. He just didn't want Ron and Neville to go hungry because of him...

There wasn't enough time to go back to 308 and work on his projects before classes started up once more, so Harry settled for wandering the halls, staring out over the chilly morning grounds with the first signs of flowers peeking up from under a layer of frost. It was a calming scene, and he allowed himself to stand back and relax for a moment. Hogwarts at her finest, with a tiny spiderweb of ice dusted across the windowpane and the light streaming in and framing him where he stood. He was glad he'd decided to take this little walk- it soothed his nerves and forced him to remember how beautiful the Hogwarts grounds were.

Something moved in the corner of his eye, and Harry turned slightly to see what it was. Nothing- just a cat slinking off into the shadows, probably looking for some tasty treat while its owner stuffed their face in the great hall.

When the cat spotted him, it froze, staring at him. Harry stared at it for a moment before kneeling down, holding out his hand.

"It's okay. Nice kitty..." he murmured, feeling rather stupid that he was talking to a cat. The feline looked very sleek- pure black with a single white diamond in the center of its forehead. It slowly approached the outstretched hand, finally sniffing it for a second before rubbing its head into the palm like it wanted attention. Harry smiled weakly, stroking the cat's fur as he sat down with his back pressed against the wall. "Yeah... you're a sweet kitty, aren't you? Wonder who you belong to... bet they wouldn't be too happy to see where you've gotten off to..." the cat ignored his words, only moving closer to rub its head on his knee. He allowed himself a light chuckle at this, rubbing the fur just behind the nape of the cat's neck.

"It's my cat."

He looked up, startled, to find a shorter student halfway hiding behind a pillar. From the small flash of color that he caught off their house badge, the child... likely a first year... was from Ravenclaw. Black hair as sleek as the cat's was cropped to her shoulders, and the structure of her face and tone of her skin suggested she was from somewhere in the middle-east.

Harry tried not to watch at the girl, mostly looking at the cat. He didn't want to make it seem like he was staring at her.

"She's very sweet." he murmured, letting the pet lick his fingers for a moment before he went back to stroking its fur. "What's her name?"

When he got no response, he glanced up once more to find that his own worries about staring were not what the girl was worried about. She was watching him intently, mouth slightly open.

"...what?" he asked, tilting his head to the side in confusion. The girl seemed to manage to shake off her shock, giving a weak and _very_ nervous smile to him.

"Ah, it's just... nothing. I mean..." she hesitated, still not coming out from behind the pillar. "...you like cats?"

"I like a lot of animals." he shrugged, perplexed. What was this all about?

"Not just snakes?" the girl insisted, finally getting around to saying what she was confused about. Harry blinked once.

"...no, not just snakes." he finally told her. She was a first year alright. Probably her older housemates had been telling her stories about the 'evil Harry Potter' for the majority of the last few months, and it was just that much weirder for her to experience this scene now. ...well... she didn't seem like she was _too_ lost to their bias yet. Or at least, he hoped not... "I guess you want this little kitty back, huh?" he looked back down at the cat, giving it one final pat before picking it up and placing it so it could see its owner. "Go on." he tried to push it in the girl's direction, but even when the Ravenclaw bent down and held out her hands to catch the cat's attention, it still retreated back to Harry's lap, nuzzling its head into his knee like it was begging for more attention. He awkwardly kept petting it, wondering how he could return the pet to its owner without scaring her.

"...that's strange." she murmured, slipping out from behind the pillar. Harry glanced up at her again, confused, but found there to be a little smile on the girl's face.

"What is?"

"Sasha." she nodded to the cat. "She rarely ever takes to anyone like this. Her previous owners treated her really badly, so it's weird for her to be this affectionate with someone other than me..."

"Is that so...?" he mused, picking up the cat to hold it at eye-level. After a moment of the two of them staring one-another in the eye, Harry smiled too. "...no, you're a sweet little kitten, aren't you?" in response, Sasha licked his nose with a purr, obviously contented with her situation.

The girl watched the two of them for a moment before taking a few steps forward. When Harry glanced over at her, she stopped, still looking hesitant.

"...the older students say you try to kill muggleborns." she stated, voice slightly accusatory. He quirked an eyebrow at her.

"Do they now...?"

The girl took a step closer, this time insistently. She was only a few feet away by then.

"You don't, right?" she asked, a little more fiercely. When he refused to look at her, instead paying attention to Sasha, she walked right up in front of him. "I know Colin. We would eat lunch together. He was really sweet, and he was really obsessed with you. He would always tell me how awesome you were, and how much he looked up to you." Harry's eyes went slightly wide as he looked back up at her, Sasha temporarily forgotten. The Ravenclaw's soft brown eyes stared down at him as she bit her lip, hands trembling. "You wouldn't really hurt someone who thought that way about you, right...?"

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Okay, so you _SERIOUSLY_ thought that Harry was just going to become friends with Draco out of the blue after he insulted all of his best friends like that? E.R Rowling had the closest guess as to what was about to happen- but no matter how amusing it would have been to have Harry karate-flip Draco over the table, I'm afraid I had to just stick with this. :)

You guys are great, really. Thanks for putting up with such a long time between updates. The thing is, I suddenly realized that I had every scene planned out in my head _other_ than the one that I needed to update. So pretty much, I'm warning you about one thing: I'm probably going to write the whole story out and edit it before I update any more chapters. Yes, that means Hiatus. And I hate Hiatus just as much as you all do. DX But it means I'll get to make it better, and you all want this to be a good story, right?

Thanks, guys.


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